Ambient light effect petition
 

Hi guys!

Just wanted to share with you an effect that was initially released with the game, but later withdrawn through a patch some time ago. It's the ambient light reflections that you'll see when looking at the aircraft from shallow angles.

Here's an example of what it looks like ingame:

https://lh4.googleusercontent.com/-U...6-01_00020.jpg

Notice under the wings, there seem to be a few bright "lines" that reflect the ambient light of the atmosphere! It really makes the game look ALOT more picture-realistic and I sorely miss it! It's been gone ever since the patch before the one where we got the over-shiny hurricane. Now the planes look graphics-wise like in Old IL-2 to me. No more interesting reflections etc...

The thing to keep in mind is that it's already been implemented and even available in the past, so why it ever went away has me baffled, seeing that it made the aircraft look perfect!

I have taken some pictures at work today of military aircraft paint to show that even though it's supposed to serve as non-reflective for obvious reasons, it still reflects a lot of light at the right angles!

Here:

First image is to show the actual color of the paint, when viewed from an angle where it does not reflect ambient light, or is consumed by the brighter sunlight!

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../WP_000266.jpg

The next two images clearly emphasize the effect seen from ambient sky-coloured light.. Notice around drag-chute box aswell, where direct sunlight is missing, it's easier to see the reflections.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../WP_000267.jpg

And over the horizontal stabilizer...

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../WP_000265.jpg

And finally under the wing, reflecting ambient ground light.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v4.../WP_000268.jpg
.

This is ALL very matte paint, but you clearly see the nice realistic look to it, and it USED to be ingame, it has just been removed.

EDIT:
I want a hands up on everyone who wants it back as an OPTION since it makes no gameplay difference but might have an impact on FPS

Yes please.

Strike, I don't think anyone could have captured a better picture to show this effect off... fantastic shot dude.

I'd quite like the reflectiveness that we had for a few weeks back too, maybe not quite as strong but it did look good at times.

So why was it taking out in the first place?
if they take much more away from this game, there wont be nothing left:(

Yeah if they continue like this we will end up with World of Planes :eek: ;)

If they put this in then AA etc. no one would be able to run it at this point. Thats why these things are removed. They put them back as they find fps savings through optimization. Removing AA is an old trick that devs have used many times to diguise a poorly running game.

Agreed apart from the fact that we do have AA in this game LOL

Well if there is AA in this game it 2x because it looks like aweful on my end and for a lot of other people. if this is their idea of AA its a fail. LOL

http://forum.1cpublishing.eu/showthr...=anti+aliasing

Yay.

The aircraft do look more flat and less connected to their environment without that ambient light effect.

It may just be my imagination, but I also seem to remember the bare metal patches on the weathered planes used to reflect their environment too. For example, when you rolled the plane, the reflection on the bare metal would change from green to blue as it moved from reflecting the ground to the sky. Whereas at the moment it just changes from dull to shiny.

There's a pre-release development update picture of a bare-metal Stuka showing this effect very clearly.

Hopefully the loss of these ambient reflection effects is just a temporary result of the major graphics overhaul that's under way. If they've been removed just to improve frame-rates, maybe they could be re-introduced as an ultra setting in the plane detail section of the graphics options.

It's one thing for the developers to tweak the overall look of the game, but it's another thing again to take effects out altogether.

As the OP and others have said, it's those kinds of details that help differentiate the current game from others, including the old IL-2. When you put them all together; the graphics, sound, flight-model and historical details, they add up to a flight-simming experience you can't get elsewhere. Take enough of them away or leave them broken for too long and the whole package loses it's appeal.