I'll make one post here about IL2, as I have played the sim from December 2001.
You cannot judge the IL2 series from a totally offline perspective. AI being AI, the only way to judge anything is by playing against another human being. The AI have simplified flight models, and always fly and shoot at the maximum performance level. they are computer controlled after all.
The FMs for the most part are quite good vs. real life aircraft, with some exceptions of course, but you must remember that flight dynamics, if fully and accurately modeled would not be able to run on a PC, so compromises are necessary. The real pilots in my "squad", the BlitzPigs (we prefer to call it a movement,
), have their issues with the aircraft dynamics for sure, but to a man they all say that it is by far the best thing going in terms of capturing flight on the PC. And these are not just guys pottering around in Cessna 172s. We have a former RAF Jaguar pilot, a commercial pilot, and a vintage aircraft aerobatics instructor in our ranks. I will take their word over the armchair experts on the UBI-Zoo forums, or here, any day of the week.
I would also venture to say that the AI in SH4 are every bit as bad as the AI in the IL2 series. And they are easier to defeat because ships are so slow, and hence even more predictable. But I will give credit where it is due, the SH4 offline experience is better than IL2's, by far. But difficult it is not. Only more time consuming.
And both SH4 and IL2, in the form of it's Pacific theater add on/expansion "Pacific Fighters" both suffer from a common problem. To wit:
European developers that do not have even a basic knowledge of the Pacific War, it's combatants, the tactics and equipment used, and it's importance.
Hence the lack of proper Aircraft/Ships/Maps in IL2's Pacific Fighters, and the poorly depicted mission types, submarine performance/range parameters, and amazingly, aircraft utilization in SH4. (take a look at the fighters on the deck of a US carrier in 1944, and you will see Brewster Buffalos. Yeah, these guys know their stuff all right...
