Update 4.005
Dear Friends,
The IL-2 Sturmovik team is happy to announce that another, very big and important milestone in the evolution of our project has been reached and its result is ready to be downloaded to your PCs. This time the update doesn't bring new content since the development of the new Normandy project is at the very early stage. However, it contains an enormous block of changes paramount for the IL-2 as a combat flight-sim, namely the aircraft damage model and munitions damage calculations. Earlier we have published several Dev Blogs dedicated to these changes, where they are covered in detail and how they affect the gameplay.
Additionally, the external textures of four previously released aircraft are now available in 4K quality thanks to Martin =ICDP= Catney and Francisco =BlackHellHound1= Bindraban. 4 additional ground vehicles were added to the sim - two ambulances and two fuel trucks. And a new language has been added to the game - Simplified Chinese! Well, at least most of the sim is translated, some parts will have to wait. More on that below.
But of course, this is not quite all we have done. The change-list contains a whopping 140 changes - this is the all-time record for our project! There are numerous improvements to the aircraft simulation, aircraft models, player controlled tanks (Tank Crew) and artificial intelligence (AI). The causes of several important issues we weren't able to reproduce previously due to their rarity and randomness and thus fix before were finally found and fixed. The full list contains many other improvements and fixes as well. Take a look:
Main features
1. MiG-3 series 24 exterior textures, including damage, are in 4K quality now thanks to Martin =ICDP= Catney;
2. Pe-2 series 35 exterior textures, including damage, are in 4K quality now thanks to Martin =ICDP= Catney;
3. Pe-2 series 87 exterior textures, including damage, are in 4K quality now thanks to Martin =ICDP= Catney;
4. Bf 109 G-4 exterior textures, including damage, are in 4K quality now thanks to Francisco =BlackHellHound1= Bindraban;
5. Binoculars have been added for tank commanders (press LCtrl + 5);
6. GAZ-55 ambulance vehicle added;
7. BZ-35 fuel truck added;
8. Opel Blitz ambulance vehicle added;
9. Opel Blitz Tankwagen fuel truck added;
10. New language added - Chinese Simplified (简体中文). The career mode is not yet completely translated since the newspaper articles and some squadron histories and award descriptions are in English (they are not necessary for playing though). The Chinese symbols in the pilot name won’t work sadly due to the technical limitations in the mission file format.
Aircraft Damage Model Improvements
11. All aircraft got the new, significantly more advanced version of the airframe damage calculations: each aircraft has its own geometrical sizes of the airframe parts and the material types while the damage calculations take into account the peculiarities of the AP, blast and fragmentation damage;
12. A complete rework of aircraft skin damage calculations has been done and it now takes into account the projectile caliber or its HE capability: now AP ammo and bullets damage the aircraft skin to much lesser extent than HE ammo while ramming an aircraft with a propeller of another instantly causes severe aircraft skin damage;
13. Visual hit effects (sparks, splinters, etc.) and sound effects now depend on the material of a hit part of the aircraft;
14. A one projectile impact won’t erroneously cause multiple (doubling) damage effects on the airframe parts which have several hitboxes;
15. Projectile impacts (and ramming an aircraft with a propeller of another) at the parts which don’t have their own cracks modeled in 3D visual model (for instance, when shooting at a wing root that should cause a crack in the wing on the aircraft where a crack at the wing base is not modeled) are calculated in more detail;
16. Projectile impacts (and ramming an aircraft with a propeller of another) at the parts not connected to the airframe won’t damage the airframe (for example, hitting an engine nacelle of a twin-engine aircraft won’t destroy a wing);
17. The calculations of the energy impulse transfer to an aircraft from a munition it was hit by now take into account the shots that went through it;
18. Exploding shells no longer damage the airframe by their initial kinetic energy of an intact shell, only by the blast and the kinetic energy of its fragments;
19. The following visual effects of the aircraft fragments were corrected (turned on when needed and off when not needed): landing gear dust (in the flight), the lighting from landing and navigation lights, guns firing and engine exhausts, smoke from smoke generators and vortex trails from the wingtips);
20. The found discrepancies between a new and repaired aircraft aerodynamics have been fixed;
21. A rare issue that could cause the airframe cracks to preserve after repairing has been found and fixed;
22. The modeling of the combat damage of the piston engine crank gear became more detailed and takes into account the engine type (for instance, the damage of the crank gear of the air-cooled engines happens more rarely than crank gear of the liquid-cooled engines) and the peculiarities of the armor penetration, blast and fragmentation effects of the munitions. The damage of the crank gear can cause the wedging up and seizing up of the crankshaft while the heavy momentary incurred damage can cause the immediate stop of the crankshaft;
23. It is now possible to damage one or several engine cylinders at once by weapons fire, reducing its power output. Damaged pistons can affect the crank gear and can be accompanied by oil and coolant leaks. The calculations of the incurred damage and leakage values take into account the type of the engine and the peculiarities of the armor penetration, blast and fragmentation effects of the munitions;
24. The calculations of an engine fire probability from torn fuel lines and oil leaks take into account the peculiarities of the armor penetration, blast and fragmentation effects of the munitions;
25. The physical model of the engine now differentiates the two types of oil leaks: from the engine and from the oil system;
26. Only the actual oil leak from the engine now soils up the canopy instead of a general engine damage;
27. An excessive amount of piston engine shaking caused by the crank gear damage has been reduced;
28. The calculations of an oil tank or oil radiator leak probability, its size and leakage value take into account the peculiarities of the armor penetration and fragmentation effects of the munitions in detail;
29. The calculations of a coolant tank or water radiator leak probability, its size and leakage value take into account the peculiarities of the armor penetration and fragmentation effects of the munitions in detail;
30. The calculations of a fuel tank leak probability, its size and leakage value take into account the peculiarities of the armor penetration and fragmentation effects of the munitions in detail. The fuel tanks leak protection will be taken into account later, when the next level fuel system modeling is finished;
31. The visual intensity of a fuel, oil, and coolant leaks now corresponds to the actual severity of a leak closer;
32. When calculating the probabilities of a fuel tank fire and explosion, the different AP, blast and fragments effects are taken into account as well as the amount of the fuel leaking from the tank at the moment. Inert-gas pressurization and other fire countermeasures will be taken into account later when the next level fuel system modeling is finished;
33. Bf 110 G-2, Bf 110 E-2 and Hs-129 B-2 right engines won’t be excessively damaged by explosion fragments;
34. P-38J-25: a stabilizer won’t be destroyed by small fluctuating stress loads;
35. P-38J-25: it is now possible to hit and damage the right engine radiators;
36. P-51D-15: it is now possible to hit its oil tank and its armored visor is correctly included in the armor protection calculations;
37. P-51D-15 canopy will appear correctly soiled up by an oil leak both in internal and external views;
38. P-51D-15 3D-model won’t erroneously show the wing crack;
39. The landing gear doors on all aircraft are destroyed if landing gear wheels are torn off in retracted position;
40. Hs 129 B-2: the destruction of the right landing gear door won’t generate the landing gear door debris on the left;
41. Bf-109 (all series except E7): the loss of the vertical stabilizer and the central part of the horizontal stabilizer is temporarily blocked due to the interdependence of this damage in the 3D model, which makes this point extremely vulnerable to combat damage and causes undesirable results. We will try to move the breaking point above the stabilizer in the future and fix this limitation. Damage to the rudder, elevators and horizontal stabs are still possible and the rudder and elevators can still be detached. And the left and right portions of the horizontal stab can also be lost;
42. Bf-109 (all series): the mixed up locations where the debris of the landing gear bay doors appear have been corrected;
43. MiG-3 series 24: the main landing gear bay doors in the wing can also be torn off by an excessive ram air pressure;
44. Excessive rear hemisphere protection of the Pe-2 gunners from the fragments has been corrected;
45. Ju-52/3m g4e: the oil level gauges display the correct amount of the oil left even if it is completely gone or after the oil system repair;
46. Ju-52/3m g4e: first pilot bailing out won’t cause the death of the second pilot and the gunner;
General Damage Model Improvements (for all objects in the sim)
47. A complete overhaul of the blast and fragmentation damage, as well as armor penetration damage has been finished, including, but not limited to: correction of calculation errors, calculation speed optimizations, protection of the calculation results for finding possible errors in the initial data;
48. Insufficient blast damage in case of a very near explosion or inner explosion has been corrected;
49. The number of fragments hitting an object is correctly calculated basing on the distance to an explosion, including the case of inner explosion;
50. Now there is a possibility of a ‘stray fragment’ impact when the expectation function gives less than one fragment due to the distance to the explosion (outside the kill area), which is important in a case of multiple explosions;
51. The armor penetration ability and damage of projectile increases if the resulting impact velocity exceeds the muzzle velocity of a projectile in the reference test data;
52. The fragmentation damage modeling is made less abstract for all ammunition types: the formation of the fragments, their initial speeds, masses and sizes are calculated and their loss of velocity with the distance traveled is calculated using the modern estimates of their resistance factor and the integration of their movements;
53. The calculations of the penetration ability of the combined HE and frag damage is also less abstract. Instead of using an empirical parameter, the system now uses the speed, mass, and size of a fragment to model a penetration and the massed impact in case of a near explosion is also modeled;
54. Since the calculations of the penetration ability and the energy of fragments were changed, the excessive effectiveness of the bombs against armored targets at large distances has been reduced, but a very close explosion is much more effective than before;
55. The penetration ability of the fragments created by shells containing a small amount of explosives relative to their overall mass was also reduced because of the same reason;
56. The blast damage calculations use a more accurate power law depending on the distance to the blast center. The damage inflicted by a blast and its ability to break through an armor sheet now drops as the distance increases faster than before, but became much more powerful at very short distances;
57. Engines, drivetrains, reduction gearboxes, ammo racks and other large pieces of equipment now have their own hard casings modeled where applicable and they can protect them from some damage;
58. In a rare case of a direct bomb hit at a turret of a flying aircraft, aerostat or a parachute there won’t be a detonation delay that could cause it to explode at a distance to the object;
59. The severity of a wound depends on the impact area: a head hit is more critical than a body one while a body hit is less severe than it was before;
60. The crew members experience less pain shock from wounds and impacts;
Player controllable tanks improvements
61. The death of a radio operator now blocks the external communications;
62. Pz.III-L and T-34 STZ tanks ammo racks now are damageable;
63.The physical collision model of the Pz.III-L turret now correctly rotates together with the visual model of the turret;
64. The physical collision model of the T-34 STZ main gun barrel now correctly corresponds to its visual model;
65. The M4A2 commander’s machine gun can be damaged;
66. In the event of a catastrophic detonation, the turret flying away from Pz.III-L and T-34 STZ tanks will be visually damaged;
67. A knocked out machine gun won’t incorrectly cause the death of its operator;
68. The issue that could result in the destruction of a tank when its main gun and coaxial MG are knocked out has been found and fixed;
69. Several commands of the tank commander (for example, "Attack ground targets on sight") will work even if the mission script doesn’t include any commands for this tank;
70. Several non-working technochat messages about turret systems failure and repair (coaxial machine gun, main and backup turret traverse, vertical aiming mechanism, etc.) have been fixed;
71. Pz.Kpfw.III.Ausf.M, Pz.Kpfw.IV.Ausf.G and M4A2 tracks tension is correctly animated (it was reversed);
72. The tank radio transmitter failure makes the communication with other tanks of the unit impossible;
73. Viewing instruments on KV-1s tanks made more detailed;
74. The issue with KV-1s tracks visibly moving in the opposite direction when accelerating has been minimized;
75. The casing of the various large systems (engine, gearbox, ammunition) can protect them from shell fragments;
76. An additional armor sheet on the front hull of the KV-1s is now modeled;
AI Improvements
77. The AI pilots of the high-speed aircraft now try to use their advantage over significantly slower aircraft using the hit and run tactics;
78. The AI pilots of the high-speed aircraft aim better when firing the guns;
79. A failed bombing run won’t cause an AI-controlled bomber to fly beyond the map borders;
80. An AI pilot estimates the time required to destroy a ground target better;
81. The AI pilots won’t try to move the control surfaces of a crashed aircraft;
82. P-51D AI pilot will always close the canopy before taking off;
83. Gunners won’t do unnecessary motions when bailing out;
84. Additional improvements were made in the ground vehicle obstacle avoidance algorithm;
85. A rare issue that could cause vehicles of a column to move directly North after an emergency stop has been found and fixed;
86. AI-controlled ground based guns and MGs aim better in heavy wind weather conditions;
87. 76mm and 77mm AAA of World War I era aim better;
Visual aircraft models improvements
88. The bomb control panel on all Bf 109 3D-models is now hidden in the outside view if no bombs are installed;
89. The right landing gear wheel of the Bf 109 E-7 is no longer visible from a large distance when the right wing is lost;
90. The Bf-109 G-14 canopy cable looks correct when the canopy is open;
91. The gap between the bomb holder and Fw 190 A3 and Fw 190 A5 fuselages has been removed;
92. The gear wheels of the chain drive of the He-111 bomb bay doors are animated now;
93. The An-4 compass on Pe-2s has a functioning backlight now;
94. The excessive visibility of IL-2 mod. 1943 at large distances caused by a wrong glare setting has been corrected;
95. The rear navigation light of the La-5FN won’t be visible from the cockpit;
96. A damaged LaGG-3 won’t appear to have through holes when zooming out;
97. The Yak-1b rear wheel trace on the ground won’t visually thicken when zooming out;
98. P-51D and Tempest radio station bulbs made brighter when turned on;
99. An incorrect flare visual effect on the P-51D fuselage has been fixed;
100. An incorrect flare visual effect on the Fokker D.VII wingtips has been fixed;
101. Left ailerons of Fokker D.VII and Fokker D.VIIF won’t cause visible z-fighting effect;
102. S.E.5a: a dead or unconscious pilot or gunner won’t clip through a cabin side;
103. The animation of the 2000-pound bomb M66 impeller has been fixed;
Other aircraft changes
104. Another error that could cause the hits on the own aircraft to be not audible in multiplayer has been found and fixed;
105. When in the cockpit, the player will now hear different sounds when different parts (materials) of the aircraft are hit different types of ammunition (before that, sounds differed only by the type of ammunition and only in open cockpits or in an external view);
106. The ram air sounds in the cockpits of all aircraft have been re-adjusted, the sound changes depending on the state of the canopy (open or closed) as well as the position of the pilot's head relatively to the windscreen;
107. The positioning of the engine sounds in the cockpits has been improved as well;
108. Bf 109 G-6 in-cockpit sounds were corrected;
109. The issue with the pilots posing in weird ways should be gone now;
110. Ju-88 top shooter won’t continue to fire when the canopy and the MGs are jettisoned;
111. It is now possible to shoot a signal flare after opening the IL-2 mod.1943 cockpit;
112. The trace of an aircraft after a belly landing won’t disappear when zooming in;
113. Flying Circus planes will correctly show the dust from wheels effect;
114. P-51D wheels leave correct traces and their dust effects were corrected;
115. Opened P-51D landing gear bays cause less drag;
116. Bomb detonator switches are no longer inverted on P-51D;
117. A-20B, La-5 series 8 and La-5FN: it’s now possible to move the throttle control when it is in the idle position and ‘Engine auto control’ helper is enabled in the options;
118. FFB vibrations increased during control surfaces buffeting at terminal flight speeds;
119. Now a crewless aircraft will be removed from the simulation when it stays on the ground for 30 seconds (previously it was removed when its altitude was less than 10 meters and speed less than 10 meters per second);
Ground and naval objects
120. Projectiles of the multi-barreled anti-aircraft guns visually appear aligned with the positions of the individual barrels;
121. Tanks and trucks won’t leave marks on concrete surfaces;
122. Vehicles won’t create so much dust when moving on concrete and paved surfaces;
123. TRG_Spawn mission logic element won’t cause the spawned vehicles to have visual effects of a damaged engine;
124. The issue of random destruction of a train in QMB has been found and fixed;
125. Simple AI-controlled ground vehicles won’t visibly ‘shudder’ when moving on steep slopes, especially on the Prokhorovka map;
126. Sd Kfz 251 Wurfrahmen 40 rockets launch correctly visually;
127. The upper and lower armor of simple AI tanks has been corrected (made more resistant to fragments);
128. The visual model of a static railway tank has been updated (its frame);
129. The static T-34 model texture that appears at a certain distance has been corrected;
130. Railway wagons and locomotives won’t receive critical damage from any first hit;
131. A graphical corruption caused by G-5 gunboat firing its M-8M rockets has been fixed;
132. The issue that could make the naval guns indestructible has been found and fixed;
133. Ships that run aground will stop earlier and won’t display water wake effects;
134. A random issue with the parachute not completely descending to the ground has been fixed;
Other changes
135. VR zoom can be made instantaneous if the default speed gives you nausea - set the value of the vr_zoom_speed parameter to 1 (it is located in the camera section in data\startup.cfg file);
136. Ricochet sounds and graphic effects were added;
137. The physical collision models of the European suburban buildings in some blocks on the Arras map now correspond to their visual models;
138. The trees that prevented takeoff and landing were removed at the end of the strip of the Florennes airfield;
139. Bailed out pilots can be correctly captured by the enemy in the Bodenplatte career;
140. MCU_Waypoint mission logic element won’t receive input from other elements when deactivated.
Enjoy!
The Sturmovik Team