We’ve been calling it the Odessa update or the Odessa/Finland Battle or other variations over these last several months while 1CGS has slowly rolled out their plans for another release in the IL-2 Sturmovik: Great Battles Series. Defense and Liberation is the name and we have new project information, a confirmed aircraft set, and more.
Mostly Soviet, mix of early and late war
I’ve noticed that there has been a bit of a pattern with the IL-2 series with the first and now third iterations at least where some of the final projects have been a little more scattered and disjointed in theme compared to prior editions – though that was never a huge issue for the ever popular IL-2 1946 release. While that one seemed to focus on hypothetical what-if 1946 content, it was really a big tent release bringing in a ton of additional content built on what was available before and filling in the missing areas.
Defense and Liberation is likely to be the last major release of content for the Great Battles Series and it looks to more or less repeat the “filling in the cracks” goal from 1946 albeit with a different focus on content.
1CGS has today revealed the aircraft set for the series. While most of the aircraft are Soviet types, there are two German aircraft filling in the mix so lets start with those. The Bf109E-4 is an earlier iteration of the E-7 available in Battle of Moscow, and the Ju-87D-5 is a later edition from the D-3. The D-5 gives us the last major variant of the Stuka dive bomber and one that saw service on the Eastern Front even in 1944.
The Soviet side picks up the I-153, LaGG-3 (Series 4), and Yak-1 (Series 23) from the 1941 time period and then the IL-2 Model 1944 (with the “arrow wing configuration), Yak-3 (Series 9) and La-7 (Series 1) for the late 1944 time period.
The product will launch with two maps: Karelia (made by the Kartta Komppania group whom I interviewed some time ago) and Odessa. Both maps will have Career mode and will both have early and late war time periods. A 24mb large scale version of what the Odessa map will include is available here.
The overall package will include two maps, four career mode campaigns, and eight aircraft.
There have been mentions of B-239 and G.50 developments by 1CGS’ community manager as third party developments (presumably similar to how the IAR 80/81 was done) that would slot nicely into the Karelia map and campaign. It doesn’t sound certain yet if those will happen but its possible.
Launch pre-order and early access is anticipated to begin late spring of 2025 and full release achieved by the end of 2025. It looks like Great Battles will go out with a burst of new content that helps fill in the cracks left by prior iterations and fittingly give us the later model 1944 IL-2 to more or less tell most of the Sturmovik’s story…even if the series doesn’t end in a Berlin scenario.
Stormbirds 
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