The latest developer diary update from 1C Game Studios is short on text but big on screenshots as we’ve got our best look at the Mosquito for IL-2: Battle of Normandy. Let’s have a look!

More Mosquitos

Fans of the De Havilland Mosquito have gone for a while without news of the aircraft appearing in any sim and now the reverse is true as both Eagle Dynamics and 1C Game Studios show off their respective work on the type. 1CGS of course announced their Mosquito with the start of Battle of Normandy development and showed off in several work in progress shots back in October of last year.

Now we’re seeing the fruits of that labour as the Mosquito has been shown for the first time in-engine. That’s always a good sign that progress is moving along.

1CGS is showing off some notable features with this update as well even if they haven’t spelled them out. First, the appearance of rocket rails confirms the RP-3 will be available on the aircraft. Several screenshots also show off the Mosquito Mk XVIII complete with its 57mm Molins QF 6-pounder. This gun and the 18 aircraft that it was equipped on were responsible for the sinking of several U-boats and several surface ships including a 7,500 tonne minesweeper.

Also of note are the flame dampening exhaust shrouds around the engines. These were not always fitted to the fighter-bomber variant and also did not appear in the early model of the aircraft so they are likely an available modification. Night fighter ops, sans radar, seem possible!

The update indicates that there is still much work to do by the developers as its fully fitted out and that it will initially be available with 8 different squadrons in Career mode. That suggests that the list will eventually grow but in any case you can be assured that the Mosquito will be fully available in single player.

Check out these screenshots and learn more at the latest IL-2 developer diary.

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Bomber variant?

Because it tends to come up frequently when in discussion with the Mosquito, the type came in three basic trees of variations including the fighter-bomber variant that is coming to IL-2: Battle of Normandy, a photo recon variant armed with cameras for photo taking operations, and a bomber variant.

Although the fighter-bomber variant was the most produced, it’s the bomber variant that often forms the Mosquito’s reputation as a high altitude fast bomber that was difficult to detect and even harder to intercept. There are significant differences between the fighter-bomber version and bomber version that are both highly visible (such as the glass nose and bomb aiming station) as well as under the skin details. The cockpits have slightly different arrangements as well. All of this make the most common bomber version, the B. Mk IV variant, too much of a different aircraft to be a straight modification.

But I submit that it may be an “easy” shoe-in for a Collector Plane at some point in the future being at least similar enough to the FB variant to have a starting place and being another bomber that doesn’t require additional gunner stations to be modeled. I put it in my “might happen” category!