Give me some encouragement

[Spadizzle]

I need to start off with saying how much I honestly appreciate the developers of this game and the time they put in. I mean that. This game gets a lot of things right. Part of me is still excited for the future. I cannot put into words just how badly I WANT to enjoy this game. I waited (impatiently I might add) and waited and waited with great excitement for this title. The Korean War is something not very well represented in modern flight sims. The sound effects are a huge step up from Great Battles. The detail of the aircraft is wonderful. The flight models are outstanding. And count me as one of the seemingly few people who isn't really all that concerned with the AI. I'm not very good at the game, maybe that's why lol. Commander Career is a really cool concept and has a lot of potential to be improved upon. 

But I cannot bring myself to enjoy this game at the moment. As bad as I want to. And the big reason why? The absolutely DREADFUL terrain LOD bugs and delayed terrain rendering. Switching from the technique used in Great Battles was a serious mistake as far as I can tell. Every single mission I have flown....the immersion is completely killed by mountains popping in and out, trees popping in and out, and buildings popping in and out. Specifically the tops of mountains. It is just so visually awful and jarring. Entire mountains pop from literally nowhere once you cross a distance threshold. Anytime I need to zoom in the camera to see something in the distance? Mountains appear and disappear. Trees do the same. It is the absolute worst. Shadows from the clouds appear and disappear. My rig is more than powerful enough to run this game at almost any settings (I play on a flat screen monitor not VR) and I get this ugly terrain rendering no matter what settings I choose. After WEEKS of trying to find some kind of fix I have realized that it is just part of the game right now. Which is just a massively depressing feeling. This feeling weighs on me at work LOL. I waited so long for this game just to be crushed by the performance in these first months. It feels more realistic to play Great Battles, from 13 years ago, than to play this. The way the terrain LOD was done in Great Battles is miles better than this.

The biggest reason I post this is to hear from others....how do you deal with this terrain thing? Do you just ignore it? Do some of you not experience this same issue? I see it happening in most of the YouTube videos I have watched too. Do you guys just not care about it? I'm not asking that in a condescending way, at all. I think maybe I need some morale encouragement lol. I have tried every single graphics setting in the menu. Every single one. Even dropping everything down to the lowest settings. I get absolutely no improvement. I've tried all kinds of things to improve the performance of my hardware and....nothing. 

Have the devs acknowledged this is an issue? Is there a fix in the works down the line? Or is this just the way it's going to be for the lifetime of the game? I see several scattered complaints about this issue in the forums but most responses I have seen claim "it's working as intended"....which if true is highly discouraging. Even if the fix were to take a whole year....just the knowledge that they are trying to fix it would make me feel a lot better. I haven't seen that. I didn't post this novel to be a whiney complainer even though I'm sure a lot of you will take it that way. I posted it because I still have faith and am looking for signs of this being fixed. Like I already said a dozen times I WANT to love this game so badly. If this issue was ever fixed, I would literally be glued to this game in all my free time, and I would be buying every DLC on day 1 of release. A new dev diary came out within the last day. It was just details about the next DLC. Which was slightly discouraging for me considering I want to see this issue fixed first.

 

Thoughts???

[FuriousMeow]

The DLC has no impact on bug fixing.

If they paused development while chasing and fixing bugs the only thing accomplished would be a much delayed release of further content but zero acceleration in any fixing.

This thought process needs to die, of pausing further development until everyone's bug-a-boo is fixed/resolved. Its just a patently absurd position and has never had any bearing in software development reality.

As to the issue at hand, I only see various blocks of trees render/de-render with no clear rhyme or reason. I've reported that and trust its being worked on. They can't reply to every little thing that's reported that it's being worked on or a fix is eminent. Its annoying, but it's just as "muh eemurshuns!" breaking as my cat jumping in my lap or grabbing a beer off my desk. EDIT: I'm grabbing the beer, the cat is not. He is not a fan of IPAs and prefers cat nip.

Edited September 3 by FuriousMeow

[Hetstaine]

Honestly, i ignore it. Be nice if it gets sorted though.

[YoYo]

The following settings are responsible for displaying distant textures and map objects (mesh): General graphics quality: set to high or ultra, distance landscape detail to x4, and horizon draw distance to 150km. This doesn't guarantee that everything will be constant to the horizon, but it will certainly be better. However, I agree that there is a certain "pop-up" effect of the mountain peaks themselves (mesh issue), provided the surface is okay and doesn't change. I also noticed a bug related to the peaks themselves, which shape during flight. This can be somewhat annoying. This should also be addressed in an upcoming patch.

[Dash,Polder]

Not all of it is due solely to the game, your Winsows settings are at fault for much of it.  They've gone full retard with security scans and file loading controls.  Also a lot of their hardware scheduling is broken or not set right.

It can be fixed, but your going to have to deep dive your specific system.

[Husar]

3 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

Switching from the technique used in Great Battles

I don't think they switch, but rather that the whole map is about four times more detailed, while the streaming engine is either underperforming or its draw-distance limits haven't been properly adjusted. That's why we're seeing mountains change shape, blurred terrain textures, and ground objects popping into existence out of thin air, even on max graphics settings. It's especially noticeable with the rapidly changing view during high-speed jet flight. The flickering shadows might be a separate issue related to the new DX12 renderer.

 

1 minute ago, Dash,Polder said:

Not all of it is due solely to the game, your Winsows settings are at fault for much of it.  They've gone full retard with security scans and file loading controls.  Also a lot of their hardware scheduling is broken or not set right.

It can be fixed, but your going to have to deep dive your specific system.

All the issues the OP addressed are caused by the core game engine, not by Windows security or internal system settings. I'm sure about that because I've tested all of those things myself.

 

[Husar]

3 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

Do you just ignore it? Do some of you not experience this same issue?

We all see this. I’m flying online on comms with 10 other people, and some of us care enough to report what we see, while others don’t care or simply ignore it and patiently wait for a fix.

Edited September 3 by Husar

[GiftGruen]

Tbh - I just ignore it in the meanwhile.   While I fully understand ( and also feel it ) that these popup effects can be absolutely annoying, it's also a matter of what you concentrate on.  I mean - if you want to be annoyed ore expect to be annoyed - you will be annoyed.

Easy said, I know.   I personally observe the same about my personal hazzle with this stupid AI.  Since I expect the AI to be dumb, I see each dumb behaviour and can hardly ignore it.  Last week my Mig15 flight of 12 planes lost 10. I dont know excactly why but - didnt touch Korea since because of frustration.

On the other hand, this game is sheer beauty and joy in moments where you can 'swipe away' AI hazzles and VR performance restructions and PopUp annoyance and all the other 'earlybird' stuff. I hope ( and believe ) that this engine will grow and get adult.

[AndreiTomescu]

4 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

how do you deal with this terrain thing? Do you just ignore it?

It's easyer to ignore a town flickering than all AI wingman crushing into ground.

Higher your settings, if hardware allows, better image overall. 4x distant, 100-130 km distance are a must

[AEthelraedUnraed]

4 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

The biggest reason I post this is to hear from others....how do you deal with this terrain thing? Do you just ignore it? Do some of you not experience this same issue? I see it happening in most of the YouTube videos I have watched too. Do you guys just not care about it?

I ignore it. It honestly doesn't bother me all that much; I'm aware that I'm playing a game, and so far I've never played any game where there weren't any telltale signs of that. When the terrain does load correctly, the scenery is absolutely gorgeous and I don't let the occasional issues ruin my enjoyment of those moments. 

5 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

Have the devs acknowledged this is an issue? Is there a fix in the works down the line?

The Devs generally don't acknowledge issues, so the fact that it hasn't been acknowledged (AFAIK) doesn't really mean a thing regarding whether or not a fix is in the works.

4 hours ago, FuriousMeow said:

I'm grabbing the beer, the cat is not. He is not a fan of IPAs and prefers cat nip.

With all the rubbish released on the market since IPAs became popular a decade or so ago, I don't blame him. I'll have a good old Blond or Tripel instead.

[Viking1]

I noticed some LOD adjustments with hill tops today, quite minor on my system. I'm running almost full Ultra in game at 4k No FSR with MSAAx2 - 55 fps.

Ryzen 7800x3d, AMD 9070XT (16GB), 64GB DDR5 @6000, 2x Samsung 990 Pro. FPS uncapped in Adrenalin software.

Edited September 3 by Viking1

[robzerg]

Once I set landscape detail to 'x3' this stopped the texture/detail pop-in issues for me.  The biggest issue I have at the moment is micro-stutters every second or two when close to the ground (smooth - slight jump - smooth - slight jump etc irrespective of framerate). This seems especially prevalent when I'm turning and looking down at the landscape, such as tracking an enemy below me. I imagine things will improve though, or I'll find some setting/tweak to eradicate this.

[Jaegermeister]

I honestly never noticed terrain popping in. Maybe my VR resolution is so low I don’t see it?

[AndreiTomescu]

2 hours ago, robzerg said:

or I'll find some setting/tweak to eradicate this

capp fps near the lowest drop. maybe a tad above it. See, the framerate displayed ingame is not gonna change unless the drop is a bit longer. so it seems it's steady. But if the fps 99% lows are more than 20 lower in respect of the highest fps, this micro stutter is visible.

Well, at least this worked for me. Anyhow, a fixed fps is very helpful. Dunno if same rules apply in VR. YoYo and Viking1 did both some strong research on settings and cures.

[FuriousMeow]

13 hours ago, AEthelraedUnraed said:

 

With all the rubbish released on the market since IPAs became popular a decade or so ago, I don't blame him. I'll have a good old Blond or Tripel instead.

Haha, thats fair. I only really like one IPA, the brewery is fairly local: Fair Winds Howling Gale - in Lorton, VA

Edited September 3 by FuriousMeow

[Banzai]

Here are some clips of the mountain pop up. My settings are Ultra, Distant landscape x4, 150 km draw distance. I have noticed it before when playing career. Mostly when I fly to the target and have time to focus on it. I have not realised how bad it is until I specifically looked for it to record the issue. I am happy for the guys who say that they have never noticed it. Share your in game setting and I will try them on my end. Now, does it stop me from playing the game? Not at all. Do I wish it wasn't there? Absolutely. 
 

 

[FuriousMeow]

I see the same thing in the mountains in Kuban down south, so its nothing to do with the new engine or terrain, its more noticeable in Korea because the terrain is more mountainous, 4x poly mesh, and the jets travel faster. 

But the mountains aren't popping in out of existence, they are just going from lower poly to higher poly. Don't know how much that can be improved upon, the most obvious way will then lead to complaints of terrible performance. 

[Spadizzle]

I really appreciate all the replies guys. It has helped me feel a little better lol. Thank you for not being harsh with me. I really did not want to come off as too negative because there are so many things I really enjoy about the game. I started an F-84 career and the ground attack stuff is phenomenally fun. The damage model is incredible. I really love Commander Career.

2 hours ago, FuriousMeow said:

I see the same thing in the mountains in Kuban down south, so its nothing to do with the new engine or terrain, its more noticeable in Korea because the terrain is more mountainous, 4x poly mesh, and the jets travel faster. 

I wondered about this. The previous game had mostly flat terrain except for Kuban and it made me wonder if this has always been a limitation for their engine...but I just couldn't notice until now. The trees doing the LOD popping is something I can easily deal with. It's really just the mountain peaks and tiny islands that just kill it for me.

 

7 hours ago, robzerg said:

Once I set landscape detail to 'x3' this stopped the texture/detail pop-in issues for me.  

Did you drop down from x4 to x3? Or did you raise to x3 and it stopped? I have the terrain settings all maxed out, and my hardware can easily handle it. But if dropping down to x3 for the moment gets rid of it, sign me up. Although I am pretty sure I tried this already. I'm willing to try anything at this point.

 

18 hours ago, GiftGruen said:

Tbh - I just ignore it in the meanwhile.   While I fully understand ( and also feel it ) that these popup effects can be absolutely annoying, it's also a matter of what you concentrate on.  I mean - if you want to be annoyed ore expect to be annoyed - you will be annoyed.

Last night I flew a couple missions and took on this mindset. "Just ignore it". My mission took me over the western coast with all the little islands everywhere....and the terrain popping was just sooooo bad. The tiny little islands everywhere just constantly changing LOD as I flew toward them. Even while mentally telling myself IGNORE IT, it was even worse than the mountains lol. Don't get me wrong, I still arrived and dropped my full payload on those dirty commies LOL

It's really only when flying in a straight line that it bothers me. Like when flying towards the objective. It's way more noticeable then. Once I get to my objective area and start maneuvering, I'm oblivious to it. Needless to say, a great portion of the flying in this game is straight line to the objective.

 

22 hours ago, FuriousMeow said:

The DLC has no impact on bug fixing.

If they paused development while chasing and fixing bugs the only thing accomplished would be a much delayed release of further content but zero acceleration in any fixing.

This thought process needs to die, of pausing further development until everyone's bug-a-boo is fixed/resolved. Its just a patently absurd position and has never had any bearing in software development reality.

As to the issue at hand, I only see various blocks of trees render/de-render with no clear rhyme or reason. I've reported that and trust its being worked on. They can't reply to every little thing that's reported that it's being worked on or a fix is eminent. Its annoying, but it's just as "muh eemurshuns!" breaking as my cat jumping in my lap or grabbing a beer off my desk. EDIT: I'm grabbing the beer, the cat is not. He is not a fan of IPAs and prefers cat nip.

This is really all I was worried about. "Is it being worked on". At no point was I suggesting they should pause DLC development to take care of my pet peeve. I've seen a few people bring it up in the technical forum, and the only reply from 1CGS I could find that acknowledged it seemed to suggest it was all working correctly and as intended, which was puzzling to me. Basically I interpreted the reply as "this is not a problem and there is nothing to address". I don't mean to get into a rabbit hole of negativity but....the game is not in Early Access anymore. It had a beta testing period too. I have a hard time understanding how such a blatant visual issue could be in a fully released PC game in 2026. 

3 hours ago, Banzai said:

Here are some clips of the mountain pop up. My settings are Ultra, Distant landscape x4, 150 km draw distance. I have noticed it before when playing career. Mostly when I fly to the target and have time to focus on it. I have not realised how bad it is until I specifically looked for it to record the issue. I am happy for the guys who say that they have never noticed it. Share your in game setting and I will try them on my end. Now, does it stop me from playing the game? Not at all. Do I wish it wasn't there? Absolutely. 
 

This reply was very helpful for me. Your videos clearly demonstrate the issue....but I swear the popping is more frequent in my game. I am on the same exact settings as you. Max draw distance and x4 Terrain Detail. Flat screen 1440p 165Hz, RTX 5070 12GB, 32 GB DDR5 RAM, i7 14700k, Samsung 990 Pro nvme drive. My frame rate is consistently in the hundreds. What I don't get is how irregular the popping is. Some patches of terrain further in the distance will be higher res, but random closer "squares" of terrain will be low res. It's super random. Whereas in IL-2 Great Battles, there was a radius that extended from your aircraft, and rendering would take place incrementally as you flew closer. Remember how if you zoom in you could see the trees rendering in the distance? It was all a steady radius as opposed to whatever is going on with Korea.

I can't help but shake the feeling that this problem is probably worse for people like me who don't possess the absolute TOP END graphics cards like 4090s and 5090s. It's really discouraging because I specifically bought my RTX 5070 for the release of this game. I knew I wasn't going to be putting every setting at the max but I figured for flat screen gaming on 1440p, I should be able to get good performance with that card. I've checked and my card has never used all its available memory when running the game on my chosen settings. 

19 hours ago, Husar said:

The flickering shadows might be a separate issue related to the new DX12 renderer.

When you say "flickering shadows" do you mean the ground shadows? Or all the shadows? I was getting weird flickering shadows when I first started playing the game too, but only on the ground (terrain). For instance, the shadow of my plane when on the runway would flicker like crazy. Disabling the "Terrain Roughness" setting completely eliminated it for me. 

 

 

Thanks again to all who replied.

[Spadizzle]

19 hours ago, YoYo said:

I also noticed a bug related to the peaks themselves, which shape during flight.

Yup. If they fixed this I would not have a single thing to complain about. The rest is small potatoes. It's the peaks taking shape and appearing out of thin air that bothers me tenfold. I pray to God they fix it in a patch so I can get back to being excited about stuff like future DLC. When it's fully rendered, I think the terrain in this game is absolutely gorgeous. The mountains look amazing when they render correctly. 

 

Google is giving me an AI response that says they will address the "peak morphing" in an upcoming patch. I didn't see the devs announce this, so I must have missed something. They must have discussed it somewhere on the forum here and I completely missed it. I'll keep flying missions and trying to ignore it while the devs cook. Been a hot minute since the last patch so I imagine they are hard at work.

[FuriousMeow]

While, yes its "release" that doesn't have the same state as something like Doom: The Dark Ages. Doom gets released and aside from some big fixing patches, the game's development is done. 

Korea, like GB, is in a perpetual state of development so the release label doesn't really mean as much other than the core feature set is complete. But development continues, new features will be added, old/current features improved, etc, etc. GB evolved over its life, and Korea will as well - and wherever this goes after Korea in a few years the development that goes into that new subject area will still roll back and be applied to Korea. 

So while its "released," we aren't approaching the end of development but merely the end of the beginning.

Edited September 4 by FuriousMeow

[YoYo]

3 hours ago, Spadizzle said:

The mountains look amazing when they render correctly.

So you probably haven't seen the peaks, especially the rocky ones, in MSFS2024 :). However, in new IL-2 Korea we certainly have huge progress compared to IL-2 GB, that's obvious. 👌

[Husar]

This is bad - watch at 4K

 

 

Edited September 6 by Husar

[JG14_Jagr]

Is that a shadow issue rather than changing shape?

[Husar]

6 hours ago, JG14_Jagr said:

Is that a shadow issue rather than changing shape?

Changing shapes and shadows go along.

[Spadizzle]

On 9/6/2026 at 9:31 AM, Husar said:

This is bad - watch at 4K

 

 

 

 

This is exactly what I'm talking about. This is....really bad. It's crazy to me how more people are not annoyed by this. It shouldn't be like this. I have a hard time understanding how game developers all sat in a room together, saw this, and then said "yeah, looks good, let's release" lol