A demo or free to play option may yet be in IL-2’s future

2–3 minutes

A while back I discussed the possibilities of a free-to-play or demo option for the IL-2 series. There’s a lot to be said for opening small pieces of content up to potential buyers by giving them a little an enticing them to pay for the rest. Today Jason made a tiny comment that could hint at a future like that.

Heated debate and discussion

A heated discussion topic on this subject has been raging on the forums for a few days. There are lots of points of view to consider from quality of multiplayer gaming being degraded due to increasing numbers of what may not be fully legitimate players to the idea of offering up free weekends with limited content.

lagg3-break.jpg
The LaGG-3 might be a viable entry point for players in the series.

The developers are thinking about it too

Needless to say there were a lot of comments. Some heated but clearly this is something that the community is taking note of and so are the developers.

Jason Williams did comment on the thread:

When I can make it possible we will have a free demo of some sort.

This is obviously no full confirmation or commitment to offer up a free option but its clear that its being considered.

Still a good idea?

For my part I think it’s still a good idea. Flight sims are a small market and anything that can be done to convince either old players to rejoin or new players to take a chance on the series is good.

The idea, of course, is to convince them then to buy in to the series and slowly add content as they have available funds/interest.

ju87-01
Another option might be to offer up the Stuka as a free-to-play flyable type.

IL-2: Battle of Kuban is offering up some compelling content in the form of popular American aircraft, new battle areas with interesting terrain features like mountains and open water, and a revamped and revised campaign and new co-op options. The series is slowly increasing in strength of what it offers and bang for the buck. Its a great time to try and convince someone to give it a shot.

6 responses to “A demo or free to play option may yet be in IL-2’s future”

  1. Pixel Dust Avatar
    Pixel Dust

    I bought ALL of the content in RoF, BoS , BoM and BoK, including all commercial campaigns/collector planes, because of the favorable experience and more-than-adequate performance of my PC when using the RoF free version.

    This will likely include the expansions to come, I’m sure.

    I tried it, I liked it, and I gambled that the IL-2 series would be similar to the free RoF; I was pleasantly rewarded by the similarity.

    So the “free trial” path to IL-2 series is already there, for anyone to try. Don’t really need a free-to-play version of both. If someone is interested in IL-2 and doesn’t know that RoF is its kissing cousin, then they are truly remiss. Yes, one is WWI and the other WWII, but that matters not at all in the scheme of things.

    That’s a pretty small piece of the market to pursue for the effort needed to produce (and support) a free version of BoX.

    Just saying.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    1. ShamrockOneFive Avatar
      ShamrockOneFive

      Agreed! Rise of Flight is a great way to gain entry to the series with something on the same basic game engine and with much of the same design philosophy/view controls/etc.

      There will come a point, however, where it will be less useful as a comparison point for hardware performance as the engine continues to advance for the IL-2 series. The additions of VR, DX11, 64bit, AI processing, etc. have all changed how the game demands resources – mostly for the better but the advantages are going to be mostly found on newer systems.

      Rise of Flight is certainly great in its own right and its a good way to get at least a basic idea of what the second gen IL-2 series is like.

      Like

      Reply
  2. Pixel Dust Avatar
    Pixel Dust

    I couldn’t quote the source, but there was some mention, a while ago, that the two graphics systems might be merged, to RoF’s benefit. I may be thinking of how they brought the better elements of RoF forward to BoX, like the ‘Career’ mode, and the graphical display of water elements (which RoF had a better method for than the older BoX systems).

    Just wishful thinking on my part, but that would re-vitalize RoF, and that is an income stream, too.

    Since 1C and 777 are pretty much one-and-the-same, what benefits the former enhances the latter.

    For instance, I had suggested to 1C that they release the large skin pack (already in existence) for RoF for a small payment by us; that would bring cash to the 1C table and benefit RoF. Everyone who is a fan of BoX is ready to spend money to help, it seems.

    Just my two cents, but enhancing RoF seems to be a better way of keeping cash coming than simply letting the best WWI flight simulation just die in exchange for a F2P version of BoX.

    It’s all about where to employ scarce resources.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    1. ShamrockOneFive Avatar
      ShamrockOneFive

      I think its unfortunately wishful thinking. Jason has responded to comments on the forums about upgrading Rise of Flight’s engine and the simple answer we got was along the lines of its much more complicated than you think and would take too much time.

      I’m sure there is still some cash coming in to Rise of Flight. Nearly every sale they have had I’ve spent a few more dollars picking up some aircraft I didn’t already have. It would be nice to see an upgrade there but I know they are full steam ahead on IL-2 and working hard to lay the groundwork for the pending Battle of Midway for sometime next year or 2019.

      1C Game Studios (1CGS) is the developer while 777 Studios as near as I can tell is just Jason who operates the North American side of operations (sales but now he is also the Producer). 1C itself is a large publisher.

      Scarce resources is definitely an issue… if there were many more customers and more money floating around I’m sure we’d have some great updates to both Rise of Flight and IL-2 at the same time. I’m sure they won’t entirely forget about it… and TBH it’s given me some great enjoyment despite being a few years out of date now.

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply
  3. Michael Dwyer Avatar
    Michael Dwyer

    I think you are on to something with the Stuka, but I would add the IL-2 ’41 to the demo. Let people play with two decent aircraft, but ones that are mostly targets. This will give them a taste of the game, but put them in a role they may not like. If they want to fly fighters they would then have to pay for one of the BoX sets.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply
    1. ShamrockOneFive Avatar
      ShamrockOneFive

      That’s a good idea too and I’ve read a similar suggestion. Plus having the title aircraft for the series as the free flyable makes some sense too.

      Like

      Reply

Leave a comment

Trending