IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover BLITZ

When key members of a development team cease their work on a flight simulator and when the simulator is published unfinished, reasonable concern arises that the genre is dying and that the simulator won't be installed for a very long period of time on the drives of those who bother to install it. Not unlike the Falcon 4.0 simulator, enthusiasts endeavoured to remove the deficiencies and breathe new life into the sim. Another similarity can be perceived between the Team Fusion Simulations and the Lead Pursuit companies, reflected in the fact that both companies consist of enthusiasts who made their work commercial. While the Lead Pursuit company published Falcon 4 Allied Force, Team Fusion Simulations published a patched and improved version of the IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover simulator styled IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover Blitz.

 

The new version of this simulator is recompiled, with  the executable being 64- bit, which should facilitate for more efficient usage of newer hardware. This also means that FreeTrack, which is 32- bit, won't work without the proper 64- bit .dll files installed. OpenTrack, on the other hand, will work properly. The problems one may run into while attempting to use the Saitek Evo Force stick with 64- bit versions of some other flight simulators do not exist when using the aforementioned stick with IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover Blitz. This does merit over accenting: the Evo Force stick will work perfectly with this simulator. Lastly, the graphics engine has been upgraded to DirectX 11, glitches the graphics engine suffered from have been removed and new effects have been produced.

 

Aside from several new flyable versions of already present  aircraft types, this version also brings improvements in flight modeling and damage modeling. While the previous version of this simulator left an impression of over modelled inertia, first and foremost when flying at angle of attack values close to or higher than the critical value, planes in Blitz version leave an impression closer to the that gained when viewing archive footage or when air shows are viewed in which planes modelled in the simulator are flown. In fact, the impression prevails that, with regard to this, there' s now parity between the flight modelling of the Blitz version and the old IL- 2 Sturmovik: 1946 simulator, although such an impression could be a consequence of getting used to another simulator. Consequences of corrections made can also be perceived on landing, which is now a little more difficult. Some engine part models, along with their hit boxes, have been added to some engine models, which provided the possibility of damaging the added parts as well. Additionally, the damage model was improved upon by introducing the maximum normal load coefficient and modelling the consequences of it's exceeding. The Blitz version also has the collision detection with trees enabled, which will compell the occasional simmer to finally quit flying through forests. Prop wash influence is still absent and represents the only phenomenon one can read about in fighter pilot memoirs or pilot's manuals that isn't modelled in the Blitz version.

 

The user will find that the Team Fusion Dynamic Campaign is missing from the menu right after the Blitz version has been installed. As a consequence of the inability to get into contact with The Enlightened Florist, the author of this dynamic campaign, as well as legal problems which could follow from this, Blitz was published with the scripted campaign the simulator had in it's first version only. The aforementioned campaign can however be downloaded from the internet and installed into the Blitz version, while the files provided by SadoMarxist still make some aircraft variants provided by Team Fusion patches flyable in the campaign. TheOden, the author of the dynamic mission generator for IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover, conformed his mission generator to the Blitz version, but the mission generator may be a little heavy on weaker machines because this version has all the additional models running.

 

The owners of IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover can download Blitz through Steam, through which it is distributed, free of charge. For those who want this simulator and don't have IL- 2 Sturmovik: Cliffs of Dover, the initial price of Blitz version is about half of what the previous version cost when it was first released.