Pacific fighters continues what has become the long life of IL2 Sturmovik - the best world war 2 air combat flight sim yet seen. While not perfect, it is definitely the closest we've come in terms of both functionality and execution. The primary focus of this product (which can either be used as a standalone product or as an expansion when combined with IL2 Forgotten Battles and IL2 Ace expansion pack) is the pacific theater of world war 2.

The award winning company Maddox Games was founded in 1992 and produced many pieces of software for both entertainment and serious applications, including shooters, simulators and scientific applications. In 1999 Maddox Games merged with Russia's biggest software house being led by 1C, and became 1C:Maddox Games.

Installation:
There are two ways of installing Pacific fighters - either as a stand alone product which is not compatible online with the merged installation, or the merged installation which requires both IL2 Forgotten Battles and IL2 Ace Expansion pack.

Installation is straight forward generally, though many users have experienced installation issues when trying to do the 'merged' installation. Often it is better to simply uninstall your forgotten battles + ace expansion pack, clean out any remaining files, and perform a full reinstall.

The stand alone option will give you the aircraft, ships, maps, campaigns and other game components that only belong in the Pacific theater of operations

The merged install option will only work if you already own IL-2 Sturmovik: Forgotten Battles(FB) and the Ace Expansion Pack (AEP), which include a large set of Russian and European front content. This option will join the complete series of IL-2 Sturmovik line of flight simulators into one product, where you'll be able to access to both IL-2 and PF content, and allow such things as Soviet and Luftwaffe planes over the Pacific, or Japanese bombers over Europe.

Reading the readme before installation is HIGHLY recommended.

System Requirements:
Supported OS: Windows© 98 / Me / XP / 2000
Processor: Minimum: Pentium® III or AMD Athlon ™ 1 GHz
Recommended: P4 3 Ghz or above
RAM: Minimum: 512 Mb Recommended: 1 Gb or more
Video Card: Minimum: DirectX ® 9 compatible, 64 Mb Recommended: 128 Mb or more
Sound Card: Minimum: DirectX ® 9 compatible Recommended: Audigy series
Free HD space after install: 1.1+ GB
Network Play: high speed internet connection with minimum delay is highly recommended

The simulation has native support for Trackir and Multiple controllers.

The copy protection used demands that you do not have any cd emulation software running on your system before you can launch the game - a futile attempt at copy protection that was cracked before the sim hit the shelves and aggravates purchasers who wish to run off an image of their CD whilst the original is safe.

First impressions:
Upon launching a short movie is played that uses the in game engine with a filter that makes it look like old film footage. A flight of Wildcats goes head to head with a flight of Zeros. The movie ends abruptly and is rather uninspiring as far as IL2 movies go but does manage to dazzle you with the graphical brilliance of this simulation.

Interface:
The interface design in IL2 is a small but important component to the simulation. It's structure is good but with a little polishing it could have been excellent. One of my pet peeves is that when selecting many of the toggle options, there's no definitive way to tell whether you've toggled a feature on or off unless you are already familiar with the interface. Coupled with the use of negatives to describe options - eg 'no labels' rather than just 'labels' it adds a little unnecessary complication and confusion.

The keyboard assignments section could be better than it is - by better use of display real estate (ie, you cannot see much on the screen due to the text size) - and the one GLARING deficiency is that many of the functions of the game have no default key assignments at all! not only does this make the consumer responsible for binding the functions, but they also have to make note of the assignments themselves.

Also, there is no 'wizard' to help the user configure the controls. With something as complex as this simulation a step by step system that guides the user through configuring the basic controls in addition to familiarizing them with their function would be nice.

The built in mission editor is easy to use and efficient. The community has come up with many workarounds to allow mission designers to fulfill multiplayer functionality, but some, such as being limited to using static ground targets in dogfight servers, has a small but significant effect on gameplay.

Gameplay:
IL2 Pacific Fighters has gameplay in buckets - with over 40 flyable aircraft across many locations in the Pacific theater of operations, single missions for various aircraft types, single player campaigns, multiplayer campaign, multiplayer cooperative missions and vanilla dogfighting. If merged with Forgotten Battles and the Ace Expansion Pack you are spoilt for choice.

Generally the AI is good when they are encountered individually, but there are some serious issues with units colliding while turning in formation, collisions with terrain. Additionally the AI is able to see through clouds and fog that give it an advantage over a human opponent.

All of that said, single player is excellent for preparing the simmer for the real challenge, which is facing enemy players online.

The damage modeling is excellent and very detailed and is the best I have seen within a simulation.

There is one single gameplay problem, but an understandable one. Oleg's commitment to keeping things as technically accurate as possible sometimes has an adverse affect on gameplay. One much discussed problem is the forward visibility in the FW-190. Whilst the cockpit IS technically correct, the lack of glass refraction modeling in addition to no allowances made for how much two human eyes would see very much inhibits this aircraft's usability. Many other sims have 'thinned' canopy struts to give an accurate 'real' representation of what a pilot would see whilst being 'technically' incorrect in cockpit dimensions.

Graphics:
The graphics in IL2 are outstanding and very scalable. Unusually systems at the minimum requirement levels are able to play the sim on lowest detail settings and still have an enjoyable experience. On a high end system the graphics are simply superb. The simulation supports both direct3d and opengl.

Screenshots

Sound:
The sound is well done and adds to the immersion. The music is a bit naff but you can import your own mp3 files in to replace the original music.

Multiplayer:
Ok - here is where it is ALL at in il2. 1C/Maddox has done a great job of providing a robust and reliable multiplayer experience. The net code is good and bandwidth usage is low. Some extra functionality would have been appreciated (player phone book, more polished voice comms, graphical interface for most server administrative functions) but there is nothing major missing. One of the excellent features is that any player may have their own skin and nose art which will be automatically downloaded by all other clients in the game (who have skin downloads turned on) if these skins do not already exist in their skins directories. Online squads can use this functionality to create standard skin sets, and as an example, the WingWalkers have created a set of skins with colored elevator and vertical stabilizer to assist in situational awareness - and this has proven to be very useful.

A dedicated server is available (though the community is waiting for one compatible with the latest patch which should be released shortly) that allows hosts to set up scripted dogfight servers. These usually consist of missions where each side has a limited number of planes, pilots and ground targets and is a war of attrition. The dedicated server is said to be able to support up to 128 players, though I've never seen more than 32 on a server at once. Of course the default server configuration is a vanilla dogfight server with no objective other than racking up kills.

In addition to all of this, there are many 'online wars' for organized squad Vs squad competition which use generated cooperative missions. These usually have specific objectives such as destroy particular items or protect them for a period of time.

Immersion:
In cooperative online missions the immersion is excellent. Being part of an organized online squad makes this simulation shine. Forming up as a squadron of F4U's and hammering coastal defenses at dawn whilst marines in landing craft are attempting a landing is spectacular. Many users host 'historic' missions on hyperlobby that are open to anyone who wishes to join.

Longevity:
IL2's HUGE selection of aircraft and theaters plus dynamic mission generation gives this simulation almost unmatched longevity.

Conclusion:
IL2 Pacific Fighters continues the tradition of excellence 1C/Maddox Games is becoming famous for. If you are into combat sims at all this is a must have. It is particularly suited to organized online play and has a well established community.

Maddox games have been very supportive of the community. This is one developer who delivers their promises and has a history of releasing free addons.