Anticipation is high for DCS World 2.7, however, we are going to have to wait a bit longer as Eagle Dynamics has indicated that internal testing on the patch continues and the launch into open beta will be delayed by another week.
The patch has been delayed
Eagle Dynamics community manager Big Newy is keeping the patch status thread up to date with information on the release date of the patch. The patch status has just changed in the last day or two to indicate a new release date of April 14, 2021.
This date is, of course, still subject to change as the internal testing process continues. Something that the brief statement on the thread reminds us of.
Worth the wait
I, for one, am not disappointed in the slightest by the news. Ever since the ‘Reach for the Skies’ trailer and the DCS World 2021 and Beyond videos came out, I’ve been very excited to experience the new cloud technology coming to DCS World 2.7 and like many of you, can’t wait to see it finally arrive on my own PC.
But I can wait. I have strong memories of last spring where the release of 2.5.6 set off a multi-month long hunt for performance robbing bugs and multiple calls for Eagle Dynamics to change their testing and release schedule. Eagle Dynamics took a long hard pause and fixed some significant problems. If one of those systematic fixes is a longer testing cycle for 2.7 and we end up with a smoother transition to a new version of DCS World, I will say ‘kudos’ and applaud the effort.
In the meantime, there’s always the latest ‘Reach for the Skies’ or the ‘2021 and Beyond’ trailer to watch.
Stormbirds 
Grrrrrrrr!!!
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Better to delay a bit than have some sort of disaster.
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True dat!
Very impatient for those new clouds. Going past 2.6 right to 2.7 with all sorts of goodies, maybe even a free PTO map included, this is DCS Christmas.
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I for one am sort of dreading this update. Over the years, DCS has been running more and more poorly for me. I keep upgrading my system, but it just feels like an aging engine being asked to do too much. I have no problems flying in VR with high settings for MSFS, and IL2, but DCS it’s a struggle to keep the frame rate above 20. I have gone through all the VR settings and optimization guides, and they take the game from unplayable to barely manageable.
I love DCS. Flying an F14 in VR off of a carrier is one the coolest experiences in my life. But it’s getting harder and harder to justify hopping in the cockpit.
If another halfway decent combat sim with jets came by, I would drop DCS so fast.
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20 fps does seem low. Are you exclusively playing in VR? That seems to be a weak spot for DCS.
I am holding out high hopes that the engine upgrades that are slated to come later this year such as the move to Vulkan are where DCS manages to move forward. I don’t see it as a cure-all or a slam dunk but it may help smooth a lot of performance glitches out.
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Yeah, I exclusively fly in VR, I don’t have a monitor in my flight setup anymore. It didn’t use to be 20-30, it used to be more like 30 – 40. And I can get it to 30 – 40 if I stick to less populated areas of the map, don’t use the super carrier, and fly older stuff. The huey flies just fine. The mig-21 varies per update. Single player is better than multiplayer.
But each update seems to chip a frame or two off what I can manage. I really hope the Vulkan update has an impact. Ultimately though, it seems like a pipe dream to expect this software platform to carry them much further forward.
I’ve always thought that a good bridge to a better engine would be a new game in a specific time period, such as DCS Vietnam, with a map, and 1-2 high fidelity planes per side (F-4s and F-105s vs Mig 21s)
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I agree with this 100% 2.5.6 was a disaster for me, and it looks like 2.5.7 will be even more overstuffed. I can run every sim I have on maximum settings, but DCS is consistently giving me horrendously low fps, even at pretty modest settings. At a certain point you have to work so hard to find the fun in DCS that it stops being worth it. As a primarily WWII guy I find I’m spending more and more time with IL-2, despite its limitations, and less and less with DCS.
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I disagree with giving a ED a free pass on this. I’m fine with the extra level of testing, but be honest with your statements to your customers.
When it gets to the point that every date for release gets pushed back, it’s time to start re-evaluating what your marketing team is saying. By us just shrugging our shoulders, it tells ED that they can just tell us arbitrary dates, and we won’t hold them accountable.
Instead of telling us they are pushing for release at end of March (it was supposed to be released Q1) how about say we expect release in the month of April and then release it early or middle of that month and a lot of ill-will will go away.
Obviously there are exceptions, and delays happen but it’s gotten to the point
where we can almost laughably predict when we hear something is to be released at the end of Q2 that it’s probably coming out in the middle of July.
That should be the outliers, not the norm.
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Hi Gerard,
I don’t think I’m necessarily giving Eagle Dynamics a pass on anything but I am interested by some of the comments that I’ve seen.
ED and DCS World has had some serious quality control issues with previous patches. DCS World’s 2.5.6 patch and subsequent patches took months to resolve. That they are delaying a patch that could potentially have all kinds of issues (performance among them) is the right move. I think that’s a logical editorial position for me to take. If next week they say that they have a major issue and that the dev team is going to need a couple more weeks on it pushing release into May… I’m fine with that too. Transparency is good.
The second part is around estimated release dates for patches. There are a couple of approaches for doing that but in this case we got an indication, a relatively transparent one, that the target for DCS World 2.7 would be by the end of Q1 (March 31st). Missing that by 2 weeks, in project terms, is hardly a major delay. They could have said middle of Q2 too but we always knew that end of Q1 was a target date. You can always draw a fuzzy line around something like that.
So I am curious about the ill will. Is the issue that the patch is delayed? Is the issue that the patch was “supposed” to come at a certain point but was delayed by two weeks? What ill will would there be if they released it early but it was buggy? Then the comments would turn to “they should have waited another couple of weeks” and at which point I go back to my original sentiment that a delay like this is good.
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The fact is that ED consistantly gives wrong dates. 2.7 was first said to be released for Q1, then in the end of Feburay for end of Q1, now mid April.
Release dates for features on the Hornet and F-16 are consistantly wrong.
I understand that stuff during 2020 with Covid made things tricky but this has been a problem before 2020.
I can not think of one feature or patch that ED delivered on that came out on the origional estimated date.
If a company is consistantly giving incorrect dates, does that not generate ill-will? should they not be critizied? Il-2 Great Battles does not have this same problem, why should ED be different?
I’m serious in that I don’t believe the Mi-24 will be released till mid July. Perhaps i’ll be wrong, and if so i’ll be be the first to apologize, but this is now consistant behavior for ED. Instead of saying the Mi-24 will be released by end of Q2 they should say it will be realeased June 30th at the earliest, likely later.
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1CGS does themselves a service by never giving a release date or a launch window and sidestepping that particular complaint. Instead people complain that they don’t know when the next update will be and ask all the time when X is coming and then say that development is slow.
I don’t see either strategy as one that sidesteps criticism.
I tell you what I will criticize… if 2.7’s roll out comes out the way that 2.5.6 did. If that means they miss their projected launch window, I’ll happily wait weeks or months.
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