Friday 2010-05-07 Dev. update and Discussion Thread

[gibxxi]

Seeing as I notice that the camouflage texture and insignias are independent of each other will the following be possible?

A real immersion killer on all WWII flight Sims since the dawn of the genre has been the lack of individuality between aircraft of the same type, from the same squadron.

Taking the Hurricane Mk.I screenshots already posted as an example, it bears the code "DT-A" on it's fuselage. As your probably aware, during the BoB, and indeed throughout WWII, the RAF used the first two letters of this code to denote the squadron, and the final letter to denote the individual aircraft from that squadron.

Therefore, will individual aircraft bear different letters to others from the same squadron, i.e:

DT-A,
DT-B,
DT-C... etc, etc.

Not only would add some personalization to the player's aircraft (possibly customizable by them), but it would also lay to rest the "cloned" feeling one gets when viewing multiple aircraft from the same squadron.

If each letter of the alphabet (For the RAF fighters) and all the numbers / rank insignia displayed on the aircraft were customizable by the player, it may also allow WWII historical squadrons to dress up their planes in the way their real-life counterparts were actually presented.

With only 26 letters, 10 numerals (0-9) and a certain number of rank insignia for the German planes, it would not require a massive amount of graphics to do.

Maybe also provide font templates with the mod tools after launch to that people can customize their planes in line with those of their favourite squadron.

I'm not someone who has played any of the other IL-2 titles so I'm unaware if this has been implemented in prior games. Also, I apologize if this has already been suggested.

Seeing as Oleg has already admitted to being a perfectionist, I thought I'd highlight this often neglected area of customization, as I would also welcome such an eye for detail.



Edit: Also, will ALL historically accurate insignia make it onto the German planes? or is this too touchy an issue? I know other developers have avoided this issue in the past by "omitting" certain insignia. I think you know where I'm going with this question. I only ask in the interests of historical accuracy.