BATTLE OF BRITAIN II

[Eichhörnchen]

Pleeeease! Can someone help me keep this thing aloft in Windows 8?

I know I can't expect it to work, but having played practically all the other combat flight sims over the years this is the one I would grab in a fire (if it would only STAY working) and that includes Wings of Prey and all my Ubisoft stuff.

When it's running it looks and plays beautifully, with everything maxed. Then PHWWWWFFT! "Windows Has Stopped Working" (and why would I tell Microsoft about this problem: they're not remotely interested in flight simulation since dumping fsx). It usually falls off a cliff as soon as I get in amongst the enemy bomber fleets so something's overloading, no?

I will try installing on compatibility settings but I know what to expect. Any other suggestions of a not too-complicated nature would be welcomed...:/\\!!

[Oberon]

Is this vanilla BOBII or BOBII with the BDG patches?

I don't use Win8, so I can only point to what I've googled:

http://bobgamehub.blogspot.co.uk/2013/10/fixes-for-running-bobii-under-windows-8.html

http://simhq.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/3712922/BoB_2_and_Windows_8

Hope something there helps.

[Eichhörnchen]

Wow! That was quick, Oberon. It's the basic game, pure and simple. I'll have a look at those links now; just wanted to say thanks...:yeah:

Just had a look and there's promising, boyo!

[Aktungbby]

As Winston Churchill said on this date in 1940: "never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few"... Oberon?:timeout:

[Oberon]

Wow! That was quick, Oberon. It's the basic game, pure and simple. I'll have a look at those links now; just wanted to say thanks...:yeah:

Just had a look and there's promising, boyo!

Excellent news, I do hope you get it working, despite the graphical fidelity of Cliffs of Dover, there is so much more atmosphere and awe in BOBII that I too find myself drawn back into it again and again.
There's something about seeing a sky full of bombers and escorts in a manner which I haven't seen any other combat flight sim do before or ever again.
The campaign, the radio chatter, it is beautiful and I just wish that CloD could have captured a bit of that magic, but the only thing that CloD replicated of the original Battle of Britain game was the bugs and crashes to desktop. :03:

Hope it all goes well and you're up over Hellfire corner soon. :salute:

[Eichhörnchen]

Amen to that!

[Eichhörnchen]

I decided to get a pre-owned reconditioned gaming desktop with XP installed to play all my stuff, but I was praying all the while that it would play this. I was told more recently that the problem was likely to be my graphics card and it seems that was correct, because I am now finally enjoying this still truly amazing combat flight sim to the full. Just sit in the cockpit of the Me109-E and tell me it isn't the BEST 3-D 109 cockpit you ever saw.

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/picture.php?albumid=941&pictureid=7972

[HunterICX]

BOBII is just brilliant when it comes to campaign, atmosphere and AI.
afaik only Falcon 4.0 matches the quality when it comes to those 3 points.

I popped it in frequently back in the day just to hop into a Hurri (I just love that workhorse) Get up in the sky, go to the area guided by the radar to see Goering doesn't dissapoint and has send a bunch of pencils escorted by 109 and let's not forget the jaw dropping sight of the Blitz :yep:

[Eichhörnchen]

I grew up in Kent and spent all my holiday time as a kid out in the fields right below where all this took place. I often looked up in the summers and tried to imagine the dense curly vapour trails my mum described, as the combats were furiously but often noiselessly played out thousands of feet above.

Falcon 4.0 went onto my new rig too, although this plays well on my old one with absolutely no glitches or crashes; it's a solid game, that.

[Lord_magerius]

I lost my copy years ago, reading this thread makes me think it's time to start having a look on Ebay or Amazon :D

[eddie]

You can buy a digital copy from Matrix Games!

[Eichhörnchen]

I'll get some more screenshots on here, now that I'm airborne at last...

[ThaineFurrows]

I don't want to hijack this thread. However, for all that are interested in a BOB experience: Have a look at Aircombatgroup.co.uk. I'm part of that group, which currently consists of 7 Luftwaffe and 7 RAF squadrons that battle each other every Sunday in a multiplayer campaign using IL-2 Cliffs of Dover.

We are more about immersion and historical reenactment rather then competition.

Here's a video that shows a Sunday mission:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhe-G4rDLFE

[Eichhörnchen]

OK I take back what I said about BoB's cockpits... that video is awesome, so real. I haven't played Cliffs of Dover yet as I recall you have to play or activate online, and my gaming has to be offline. I guess I was thinking of Wings of Prey with my view that BoBII is still the best; that particular sim came as a big disappointment to me, with its arcade style and 'muddy' cockpit views.

CoD is clearly way ahead of the IL-2 sims... setting up 109-Es against Hurricanes in '1946' just didn't capture the right feel, and your video makes me envious.

And don't worry that you're hi-jacking this thread... it served its purpose already and I'm quite happy for it to become a Battle of Britain thread :)

[HunterICX]

CoD is clearly way ahead of the IL-2 sims... setting up 109-Es against Hurricanes in '1946' just didn't capture the right feel, and your video makes me envious.

You do know the ''1946'' was just part of the title right? It didn't restrict you in the year 1946 as you had free reign regarding the date in the mission editor to pick any day/month/year and even the time to recreate historical missions if you wished or grab them online from people that shared them.

[Schroeder]

CoD is clearly way ahead of the IL-2 sims... setting up 109-Es against Hurricanes in '1946' just didn't capture the right feel, and your video makes me envious.

To elaborate a bit on what Hunter wrote:
1946 was a "what if" add on that was attached to the regular Il2 series. It contained some new aircraft that were in the pipe but didn't finish development before the end of the war. You were not forced to use them or use any other plane in 1946. You could just as well play in 1941 for the planes of that time.:know:

[Dowly]

Fairly sure Mr. Squirrel meant the title.

[Eichhörnchen]

Yes I was just referring to 'IL-2:1946'... just saying that you could select early 109s and Hurricanes to approximate a 1940 duel over Kent, but it never felt like that. I don't know whether any of the addons (like 'Battle Over Europe') feature maps for recognisably English countryside.

Anyway, I don't like the sounds in IL-2 either: the 109s all sound like motorbikes and the Spitfires and Hurricanes sound like Cessnas or something. I love the engine sounds in 'BoB'... when another fighter goes past, you really notice that.

I haven't been keeping up with IL-2, but as far as I remember you are strictly prevented from modding engine sounds and suchlike, unlike some other flight sims.

[Raptor1]

Yes I was just referring to 'IL-2:1946'... just saying that you could select early 109s and Hurricanes to approximate a 1940 duel over Kent, but it never felt like that. I don't know whether any of the addons (like 'Battle Over Europe') feature maps for recognisably English countryside.

Anyway, I don't like the sounds in IL-2 either: the 109s all sound like motorbikes and the Spitfires and Hurricanes sound like Cessnas or something. I love the engine sounds in 'BoB'... when another fighter goes past, you really notice that.

I haven't been keeping up with IL-2, but as far as I remember you are strictly prevented from modding engine sounds and suchlike, unlike some other flight sims.

Modding IL-2 used to be problematic in the past, but it's pretty wildly accepted nowadays, and both complete sound replacement mods and proper Battle of Britain maps do exist for it.

[HunterICX]

Aahh..gotcha.

While modding IL2:1946 was forbidden, it still was done and later it became accepted and no one would stick to the vanilla game because of the horrible sounds and lack of more variety in maps like a proper channel map and the variants of aircraft like earlier spits and hurricanes.

Thus many mod packs came out since then and the best known and afaik still supported is HSFX:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FgfafpOUZDQ

Also a great deal of work has been done to Cliffs of Dover by Team Fusion irrc but I'm not really up to date to what extend they've ''fixed'' the game.

Still both games offer no match for the superb single player experience BOBII gives you but if you fancy a flight online I guess it's up to personal preference if you wish to focus on just the Battle of Britian or other theaters as well.

[Eichhörnchen]

Still both games offer no match for the superb single player experience BOBII gives you but if you fancy a flight online I guess it's up to personal preference if you wish to focus on just the Battle of Britian or other theaters as well.

I'm sure glad to hear you say that. The cloudscapes are so good in BoBII, a great improvement on Rowan's BoB, like everything else.

I saw a preview of CoD on a disc free with 'PC Pilot' magazine some long time ago now, and it all looked fantastic. But I seem to recall that once it came out it was troublesome.

Thanks for that link, btw... I'll go look at that in a minute. Does it require a Steam or U-Play account or any kind of activation for offline play (I would expect so these days).

[HunterICX]

I saw a preview of CoD on a disc free with 'PC Pilot' magazine some long time ago now, and it all looked fantastic. But I seem to recall that once it came out it was troublesome.

At release it was really an unoptimized stinker, even when obtaining a better rig later didn't help much regarding performance and after that I just gave up on it. It didn't help the official support was dropped not so long after and the game didn't met it's full potential as what was promised.
Team Fusion the guys who picked up the mess after the devs dropped it managed from what I have heard to do a pretty nice job but I haven't bothered to try it and probably never will.

Thanks for that link, btw... I'll go look at that in a minute. Does it require a Steam or U-Play account or any kind of activation for offline play (I would expect so these days).Which game?
I've got IL2 1946 on DVD which requires no account, third party application like Steam/Uplay or a constant internet connection to play.

I've got IL2: Cliffs of Dover from Steam. (can't comment on physical copies or other distributors)

[Eichhörnchen]

...The 'Cliffs of Dover', but I haven't looked for a while to see whether a disc is still available, and it would have to be a physical copy for me.

I can run '1946' properly on this new gaming rig. Before, on my old PC, the clouds used to kill the frame rates so I always had to fly with them turned off. But to me, the clouds were actually much better-looking in 'Forgotten Battles', and did nothing to harm my frame rates, so I never understood why they had to go and "improve" them for '1946'.

Here's a screenshot I gathered last night from 'BoBII'. I was looking at the great clouds in this... just as good as any you'll see in, say, 'FS2004'.

http://i.imgur.com/WLAE6hy.jpg

I think maybe I had the screen resolution wrong when I took this (I've been experimenting) as the prop and canopy glass are missing. Mind you, that sometimes happens when you take screenshots in other flight sims, such as CFS3. It can be a bit hit and miss.

[Eichhörnchen]

Take a look at this short film. It's popular to scoff at cgi in aerial combat scenes now but I used to say years ago, when it was first used in sci-fi movies, that I couldn't wait until they got around to WW2. This looks darned good to me...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLTfWeg1NIc&nohtml5=False

[Eichhörnchen]

And this from the classic movie:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHx3lWQjNWM