Pimax: Superfortress Intercepts in Korea. IL-2 Series
Taking to the skies of Korea we view the end of World Era strategic bombing tactics from the cockpit of the interceptors that stopped them
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The next entry in our Pimax Collaboration series takes us to the skies of Korea. IL-2 Series for the first time. Pimax Crystal Super Ultrawide (PCS Ultrawide) virtual reality headset reviewer ‘KOSMOS’ takes to the skies to participate in historic sorties that represent the end of certain strategic bombing tactics that once defined World War II. “Black Thursday” - one of the most infamous events that punctuated this time period - is available as a mission in this simulator. With the wide field of view and extremely high visual clarity provided by the PCS Ultrawide, we fly the interceptors against strategic bombers over Korea to see and experience it for ourselves.
Pimax: Black Friday Price Protection
We start this journey just a short time before the general international Black Friday sales period comes in. Surely everyone is saving up their money and waiting for the deals to start rolling in. Starting on November 1st, 2026, Pimax has arranged something special as a thanks for collaborating with them. Black Friday: Price Protection.
Order a headset through my affiliate link starting November 1, and Pimax offers a lower price on that model during its Black Friday sale, they’ll match the lower price and refund you the difference.
So, you don’t have to hold off on your upgrade just to wait for Black Friday. You can order early, get your headset sooner, and potentially avoid the shipping delays that can come with the holiday rush, all without worrying about missing out on a better price later.
Thanks to Pimax for the unexpected opportunity.
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Overview: Korea. IL-2 Series
This simulator is the first new IP from 1CGS in literal decades following their legendary run with IL-2 Sturmovik. The newest simulator from this studio maintains its detailed aircraft models and realistic flight simulation with the backdrop of a 250,000 km2 map of the Korean Peninsula in the 1950s reconstructed using historical documents. Players can fly over dams, ports, roads, railways, dozens of airbases and hundreds of settlements in single player missions, campaigns, career mode and multiplayer.
All of this with one of the easiest to access controller extensive back ends they have ever produced. Whether you have a game pad or force feedback flight stick, it is possible to hop into a well simulated aircraft and get airborne quickly with pre-mapped button configurations without needing to learn the first quarter of a sizable flight manual. This is thanks to the developer’s collaboration with hardware manufacturers.
This includes virtual reality headset company Pimax. Before the public release of Korea. IL-2 Series, 1CGS collaborated with them on a national roadshow. At various technology focused and flight focused expos like FlightSimExpo 2026, attendees were able to preview Korea IL-2 utilizing Pimax virtual reality headsets. The experience and data gathered during these shows was used to create VR headset presets that would automatically load up with ideal parameters for Pimax products when starting this simulator.
IL-2 Korea: Interceptions That Changed Strategic Bomber Strategy
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK or North Korea) invaded the Republic of Korea (ROK or South Korea) on June 25, 1950. Two days later, the United Nations Security Council voted to assist the ROK to resist and repel the invasion from their northern neighbor. Throughout the war the reconstituted Far Eastern Air Force of the United States Air Force deployed B-29 Superfortresses to attack troop concentrations, supply lines and manufacturing plants of the DPRK and later the Chinese People’s Volunteer Army.
The B-29 bomber formations still relied on World War II era strategic bomber strategies with large numbers of aircraft flying together in formation to provide defensive coverage for one another while concentrating bombs on target. Losses sporadically mounted throughout the war, especially when the Soviet built MiG-15 Fagot jet fighter appeared in large numbers. Despite having their own escort jet fighters like the F-84 Thunderjet and F-86 Sabre, B-29 Super Fortress losses eventually resulted in night missions being prioritized over daytime raids.
This decision was punctuated by events like Black Thursday (April 12th, 1951) and a similar, but later event known as Black Tuesday (October 23rd, 1951).
IL-2 Mission: Black Thursday
April 12th, 1951. An armada of over fifty B-29 Superfortress bombers with fighter escort targeting vital road and rail bridges for logistics in Sinuiju, North Korea on the border of the People's Republic of China. This was a highly important area where weapons and supplies flowed from China into North Korea. This was area was within what United Nations pilots called "MiG Alley", due to its high volume of air-to-air combat against DPRK flagged MiG-15s flying out of multiple air bases in the region.
In the Korea. IL-2 mission you play as one of many DPRK MiG-15 pilots scrambling from air bases across the country to form up and meet the bomber formation before they can reach Sinuiju. American made F-86s dogfighting Soviet built MiG-15s is one of the few remaining pop culture notes about this war, but the MiG-15 was built by the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics primarily to intercept American bombers during the Cold War. With its better high-altitude ceiling, rate of climb and mix of hitting 23mm and 37mm cannons, the MiG-15 could remain high at the edge of fighter escort engagement range and dive onto the bomber formations at will. Using World War proven Boom and Zoom tactics, the MiG-15 could maintain high speed while diving, attack the bombers briefly then climb back to high altitude before overwhelming defensive fire or fighter escorts could swarm them. Rather than multiple destroying multiple single-seat escort fighters, success came in the form of shooting down multi-crew B-29s or damaging them so much they were forced to abort their bombing mission.
When placed into the same scenario, KOSMOS followed the doctrine and attacked the bomber stream time and time again. With his superior field of view and immensely high pixel density, he was able to effectively see the movements of the bomber formation and their escorts reacting to ongoing attacks before committing to attack. Loitering outside of the range of counterattack, his superior vision enabled him to find opportunities and attack at will.
In the real world, this single mission resulted in 25% of B-29 Superfortress force deployed to Korea being heavily damaged or shot down. A six-month halt of any United States Air Force daylight bombing missions in MiG Alley followed as a result of this. A similar raid months later would become known at Black Tuesday with a similar mission result.
It certainly was interesting to see this moment in history through the cockpit of the interceptors that stopped them. We have waited quite some time to see a proper Korean War game, let alone a dedicated flight simulator for this conflict. We'll be sure to delve deeper into them with more videos of the action through the Pimax Crystal Super Ultrawide.
Collaboration and Review Information
Pimax Collaboration
Pimax provided Skyward Flight Media with one Pimax Crystal Super Ultrawide virtual reality headset with the intention to create content and review this product. A key part of this agreement is that any content created should be a fair and unbiased representation of the product. See our webpage dedicated to this collaboration for full details, all content and affiliate links.
Article Format
Skyward FM will write about one game/simulator per Pimax collaboration article. Besides the main focus of the article we will also discuss one or two Pimax hardware or software related points as a part of our long-term use case series.
Reviewer Background
"KOSMOS" is a Skyward FM staff member that has owned or used multiple virtual reality headsets since 2017. These include the Oculus CV1, Oculus Rift S, Meta Quest 2, Bigscreen Beyond 2 and Valve Index. His key PC specs include: Intel i9-14900KF CPU, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 and 64 GB of RAM. Microsoft Windows 11.
Affiliate Links
During the agreed upon review period Pimax has provided Skyward Flight Media with referral links and coupon code.
For the Pimax Website
For the Pimax Crystal Light
For the Pimax Crystal Super
For the Pimax Crystal Super Sony Micro OLED
For the Pimax Dream Air
Discount Code: SKY25 For Dream Air ($25 USD OFF)
Discount Code: SKY For All Headsets (2% OFF) with free $150 Accessories Voucher. Offer ends June 10th, 2026
