S!
Bliss
The 2006 screens were from the OpenGL engine and basically modified/updated IL-2 engine. The game has been re-written since then in DirectX, according to some several times. Also looking in those screens the game was not like now. Let's say Oleg and his team started 2004-2005 working on the new sim and it was released now 2011 it took them 6-7 years to accomplish what? For me it looks that the game has been coded on and off if you read more and see that there has been internal skirmishes in the team, people going and coming etc. And Oleg has left the building as well for other ventures.
Take a straight comparison. DCS:A10C Warthog from Eagle Dynamics. Another smallish team. Not made 6 years and damn it looks, feels and oozes realism all over the place. Graphics run and are more than adequate. The beta was one of the best done: pre-order and you could get a beta. Now see how many more reports there must have been and the game is damn well done. CoD was tested by The Chosen Ones and they for sure did report issues, but as some of them stated those issues DID NOT CHANGE! So it seems there has been more going on than meets the eye.
Whatever reason caused CoD to be released in a beta state is out of our reach and speculation. Only hope lies in Luthier and his team to pull the act together and patch the game, finishing it to a state is should have been. That is a hard cold fact. Finnish gaming mag that reviewed it gave no rating to it, yet. They clearly pointed out that the game is not finished yet. The reviewer is an avid simulator fan and has years of IL-2 time and other sims under his belt so he did not write the review lightly. But bottom line was the review wished the game would take off or we will only see a dumped product. US release is important, like it or not.
For me CoD is not ready but I want it to be. IL-2 can then be put to a graceful rest after 10+ years of triumph. CoD has VERY big boots to fill..
