IL-2 Sturmovik™: 1946

I enjoyed this game a lot, the 5 star reviews it recieved are well earned. The music dosn't really fit it, but that can be turned off. and doesn't affect gameplay. The automatic pilot and time accelration/deceration works better than expected. You can tell, the developers that made this game loved the genre, and wanted to provide the best experence for the player.

I don't think there's a better WWII era flight sim currently available (at least until this company releases their upcoming Battle of Britain game). The engine has been updated with enhancements for more-modern systems, and it still looks pretty good. I still play it frequently, and still don't feel like I've experienced half of what this game has to offer. This simulator is about two things: #1 - Staggering variety #2 - Staggering realism You can tone down the latter if you want to just kick the tires and light the fires. You can easily build "quick missions" with some drop-menus to explore battle possibilities --- like how the American P-80 jets would have fared against the German ME-262 jets (both jet aircraft were in the war, but I don't recall that the P-80 was ever saw combat). There are dynamic campaigns, static campaigns, instant missions, tons of fan content out on the web, and literally hundreds of flyable aircraft - and hundreds more non-fliable - from nearly every era and nationality (although a lot of the different aircraft are different models of certain aircraft - and believe me, this flight sim is realistic and detailed enough that it really does make a difference). The Russian front is perhaps a little more detailed than most, but this game includes the Pacific War expansion which allows you to fly in carrier and island battles across the Pacific Ocean. Online, multiplayer gaming rocks with this game, too. I don't think I can gush enough about this one. So I'll just stop now.

I still remember the time i've played the first IL-2 Sturmovik demo. It was unforgettable! At that time i had a chance to own Saitek Cyborg 3D GOLD, and flying this piece of art was like a dream come true. Since then, every other simulator on the market was compared in some aspects to IL-2 series, and /in my humble opinion/ none of them ever surpassed the greatness of this russian creation. With 1946 Edition, it became a must have for any flight simulator enthusiast out there - the planes /from Winter War to Pacific Theater/, the AI, visuals, physics of the aircrafts... anything, this "game" is the King of Sims. If you still hesitate on buying, stop right there and grab it. At that price it's a STEAL!

This game has graet graphics and many plane and mission options. The only problem is they shut the severs down, so you have to install something called Hyperlobby instead.

I first played IL-2 at a friend's house and I was completely amazed by it. Since I have seen this game, I was completely into it. The game is hard. Unforgiving and hard. If you want, you can adjust the realism settings from an arcade-plane-flying-"sim" to a very complex simulation. I always played on highest realism settings, I am a big fan of that. Switching these settings would never come to my mind. It will take you many hours to learn how to fly it and that is many hours for every plane! You will learn how to intercept bombers, you will learn how to bomb, and of course, you will learn how to land and take off. This is shown in video tutorials which can be quite dry and long but they are necessary if you want to fly a plane on highest realism settings. The graphics are very nice, fire effects are outdated, but look very good. I will never forget how it looked like when I was in mid-air over Pearl Harbour fighting off Japanese intruders. The atmosphere, the sound, the looks, it is just great and you will spend hours. I highly recommend it to everybody who is committed to planes and plane simulators and who is ready to spend hours to learn how to play. People who like to start very quickly and like to "just hop in and shoot some Nazis off the sky" won't have a good time. Only four stars because of the difficult first hours with the game.