A few weeks ago I wrote that Eagle Dynamics were promising that DCS World 2.5 would be out by the end of January. Now, we have confirmation from the Eagle Dynamics DCS Facebook page that there is a release date: January 31st!
Down to the wire (with a catch)
January 31st is now officially the date to wait for. Sort of. There’s a bit of a catch though, as the first release on January 31st will be a beta.
If you’re running DCS World 1.6 beta then you’ll automatically get the 2.5 beta first. If you run on the stable version, you’ll be waiting for phase two. Importantly, it’s been stated that they will be monitoring the status of the beta release of 2.5 for week or two weeks prior to moving the 1.5 stable release over to 2.5.
This is also a good way to make sure that the roll-out is working ok. Rather than running into a last minute glitch that makes the game unplayable for all, they are only risking a broken update for players who are already interested in being a bit more on the edge with the beta release.
Two more videos
To tide us over for the January 31st (or mid February) release we’ve got two more videos which I love to see from the developers.
On YouTube we have a 46-minute archived live stream by Matt Wagner flying a Huey across the new Caucasus landscape. We’ve seen this before but not at this slow speed. The change in speed gives you a different perspective and a new appreciation of the details.
Next, on Facebook we have a four seasons video which has a Mi-8 flying across more of the Caucasus terrain with all four seasons. Worth a watch!
EDIT: Now you can watch it on YouTube as well.
A few extra thoughts
Rolling out in beta first and then to the masses on the stable track after is a good idea. It’s a smart move. Their promise is kept. However, the reception is mixed and not everyone feels like they are getting DCS World 2.5 on the promised date.
I was hoping for a full roll-out by the end of the month and not the beta at the end of January and the full roll-out a week or two later.
In the grand scheme of things, a couple of weeks delay is no big deal and with hard disk space at a premium I’ll just wait for the full roll-out. I do wish we knew a little more ahead of time.
Expectations and meeting them of course is a tricky thing.
Stormbirds 
I never comment because I don’t have nothing to add, but I just wanted to say thank you for your great work keeping us up to date with our favorite sims. Now that the big update is getting closer I’m finding your posts especially useful. Cheers!
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You’re welcome! It’s fun to write about and I’m very glad to hear from people such as yourself who find the posts useful too!
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I noticed something in these new videos that had not appeared to me in earlier iterations of the Caucasus as it changes seasons: the trees, and their coloration/distribution, is somewhat off, enough to be jarring to me.
For instance, in mountainous terrain, you will see a mix of deciduous and evergreen trees in the lower elevations, but the presence of evergreens will begin to dominate as the elevation increases because they are better adapted to the colder weather. This was clearly thought about, because you can see tree lines that form at higher elevations, and trees are no longer present at the highest altitudes. You’d not expect to see so many deciduous trees at the highest elevations, where the treeline clearly is.
The colors for summer seem about right, with mixes of various greens in place. The evergreens should be the same shade of dark green as they are in Winter, but they are lighter green in this palette.
In Fall, most of the trees show shades of yellows, like the picture to the left. However, if the accurate colors were used, you’d see a mix of bright colors, like yellows, oranges and browns, with scattered dark green evergreens among them. Some of the valley shots in the Mi-8 seem about right, but the picture shown to the left is almost all yellows, when dark green trees should be more prominent and clustered closer together in higher elevations.
You’d expect to see a whole lot of barren, leafless trees in late Fall and Winter, too, to represent the deciduous.
When the scene changed to “winter”, the trees are now a mix of grey and dark green, as would be the case if evergreens predominated, since they would be the only ones retaining leaves in cold weather; they do not experience “leaf fall” as the days shorten. Evergreen tree shapes are pretty consistent and do not look like a leafy deciduous.
When the scene shifted to Spring, ALL the trees were a variety of bright, light green; evergreens do not change their colors as the seasons change. They remain dark green as always. They shed needles pretty constantly, which are brown.
I think ED needs to have some real horticulturists look at their vegetation schemes.
Otherwise, I love the level of detail and the sense of depth that the new 3D objects give the low level flight. I also noticed some shadow flickering, but that may have just been resolution issues.
To me, this is a pretty big error; it reminds me of why I didn’t buy the DCSW Nevada map: whoever created it had no idea about how America marks and controls its highway systems. The number of errors in road markings, light layouts and road construction simply shows that someone who created the built-up areas is just using the old WAGS method to get things done (also known as the Wild-Ass Guess System!).
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