I hate this game
I have 500 hours
I hate this game
I still play it.

Actual gameplay is excellent. Models and flying are great. Guns and ordnance are meaty, sounds have been improved, bomber cockpits now in (to an extent). But the grind is depressing unless you (surprise surprise) pay for premium, and I personally think the BR system is a joke. Way too many and too wide a variety of planes per tier.

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600hrs later: (2021)
Still a great game, jets are pretty good, grind is still AWFUL

This is a game I hate to like playing

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1200hrs (2023)

Gaijin has systematically ruined the economy and research progress for this game, making what was a bad grind genuinely awful. Games around rank 9.3 are filled with premium jets with all aspect missiles, versing planes with no flares, making it impossible for them to defend themselves.

Top tiers are filled with premium planes that crash on takeoff, teamkill, or TK with missiles because they have just bought that plane and have no idea what they are doing.

Gaijin has made it very difficult to play this game, which is a massive shame because the game, the mechanics, the flying, is all SO GOOD. But they make it such a chore to play because the economy and grind is SO AWFUL.

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1400hrs (2024)
CHAFFLARE. CHAFFLARE. ROLL LEFT. LOCK. CHAFFLARE.

Gaijin sorta fixed the economy, and has certainly made the grind SLIGHTLY less painful. But the battle rating compression still remains, with subsonic 1950's jets with no flares matched up with all-aspect missiles that are literally unavoidable. Playing with my brother and playing the 8.7-10.0 BR and surprise surprise he's not having fun. This is a problem that I mention in my first review and the community are STILL raising it as a problem 6 years later, and has only got worse with three whole ranks of top tier added (Phantoms+MiG23s then F14s+MiG29 then F15+F16+Su27s!)

But this will not change as the planes that hold these unavoidable missiles are of course purchasable from the get-go so a good moneymaker for Gaijin

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1600hrs (Late 2024)

Gaijin has been keeping up with their roadmap since the review bomb and the economy is generally better

But adding top tier premiums for $80 giving them active radar missiles with absolutely zero training just means there is a huge gulf between those good and those bad at top tier. And the BR still have not been decompressed so you natrually get dragged UP to top tier in planes that really struggle