User Files | La-7 Development Progress

[Graphics]

Dear Fighter Pilots, Partners and Friends, One of DCS's most powerful and often overlooked offerings is the User Files page. This supplies a wealth of free missions and campaigns, skins, documents, control profiles, and much more. Created by our very talented and dedicated community, User Files provides another dimension to your DCS experience that we hope you will explore. This week we share an update on the DCS: La-7 module brought to you by our third-party partners Octopus G. Please read the details below. Thank you for your passion and support. Yours sincerely, Eagle Dynamics

User Files Free Content From within the Downloads drop-down on the DCS website is a wealth of community-created content within User Files. All this content is free and includes single-player and multiplayer missions, campaigns, liveries, documents, device profiles, sounds, and many other types of free content that can expand and improve your DCS experience. This is a powerful resource for DCS players that guarantees endless gameplay and customization. Upon selecting User Files, you may filter content based on its Type, Localization, Map, Unit, Content Creator, and more. In addition to the mission content included with aircraft modules like interactive training missions, instant action missions, and missions, a wealth of free mission content is also available within User Files. Each entry will often include comments, screenshots, and other details to allow you to best find content that interests you. This can range from simple engagements to large-scale campaigns that include hundreds of active units. Many very talented mission and campaign creators offer thousands of missions and campaigns for your enjoyment. Although most aircraft modules include an offering of liveries spanning multiple squadrons and countries, we are limited to how much we can include to save hard disk space. User Files include over 13,000 skins across every player aircraft in DCS. If there is a particular livery you are looking for, there is a good chance that you will find it here. These are the two most popular categories of User Files, but there are other valuable offerings: Documents. There are over 1,100 documents that span aircraft tutorials, checklists, map and airfield diagrams, kneeboard templates, and much more. Device Profiles. We are living in a golden age of flight simulation peripherals, and although we include default mappings for many popular DCS aircraft, we cannot include them all. User Files includes 670 controller profiles across a wide range of peripheral manufacturers and aircraft. Sound. Like skins, DCS also allows you to replace default sounds with your own. User Files includes 364 sound offerings to cater to your audio needs. None of this would be possible without the outstanding support and dedication of the User Files contributors. Thank you!

La-7 Development Report Recent development efforts have focused on fine-tuning the aircraft’s distinctive flight model that captures the potent climb and maneuverability that made the La-7 a fearsome World War II adversary. Work on the cockpit has advanced significantly, with an emphasis on historically accurate instruments and systems that reflect the era’s engineering intricacies. Octopus G has also continued to refine the La-7’s damage model for an authentic representation of its strengths and vulnerabilities in combat, while dedicating careful attention to external and internal artwork for a truly immersive experience. We appreciate your patience and enthusiasm as this team moves forward to release, and we look forward to making it available later this year. Stay tuned for further La-7 announcements. Thank you again for your passion and support, Yours sincerely,

[Aviators]

It would be nice to improve the USER FILES section, perhaps including the ability to be able to add an item as a favorite, and be notified for each new release/upload. Unfortunately, the system is outdated.

Edited February 14 by Aviators

[primus_TR]

Indeed, some of the content available for free in the User Files section are top knotch. Through the Inferno sandbox,  Retribution a la Falcon's campaign come to mind, and many more amazingly entertaining missions and what not,  and all for free.  And many are commercial grade.  

[Jarhead0331]

I'd like a keyword search feature for the User Files section. If one exists, I haven't been able to find it.

[Sunbather]

I'd say the User Files section is hardly overlooked.

And if you are praising how great community content is (which it is), you might wanna implement some basic features to the User Files section. E.g. adding the Iraq map to the filters (the map is out for 2.5 months now...) and let us see when the last file upload was, e.g. if a campaign from 2022 got an update since then. Sure, most creators write their changelog into the text section but why not make things simple to see at one glance while you are browsing?

 

In a more unfriendly manner one could also say: it would be nice to put at least a little bit of new work into a feature before praising it in a newsletter ; )

Edited February 14 by Sunbather

[BIGNEWY]

12 minutes ago, Sunbather said:

I'd say the User Files section is hardly overlooked.

And if you are praising how great community content is (which it is), you might wanna implement some basic features to the User Files section. E.g. adding the Iraq map to the filters (the map is out for 2.5 months now...) and let us see when the last file upload was, e.g. if a campaign from 2022 got an update since then. Sure, most creators write their changelog into the text section but why not make things simple to see at one glance while you are browsing?

 

In a more unfriendly manner one could also say: it would be nice to put at least a little bit of new work into a feature before praising it in a newsletter ; )

I have already requested Iraq to be added to the search list, I will remind admin again now. 

edit: plenty of work has gone into the user files, we have been maintaining it for many years, so please keep it constructive. 

thank you 

[Beirut]

That was a mighty short newsletter. Deephack's podcast will need more things to talk about tomorrow. 

[BIGNEWY]

4 minutes ago, Beirut said:

That was a mighty short newsletter. Deephack's podcast will need more things to talk about tomorrow. 

A shorter one than usual yes, but the LA-7 news is very welcome. 

[Beirut]

Just now, BIGNEWY said:

A shorter one than usual yes, but the LA-7 news is very welcome. 

 

I'm hot and heavy for it, but I hope "later this year" turns out to be later this month.  

[motoadve]

LA-7 news are great, thanks , really looking forward to this plane. Looks like its going to be very nicely modeled.

[Sunbather]

vor 30 Minuten schrieb BIGNEWY:

I have already requested Iraq to be added to the search list, I will remind admin again now. 

edit: plenty of work has gone into the user files, we have been maintaining it for many years, so please keep it constructive. 

thank you 

That's why I said "new work". Clearly, a lot of work has gone into this and it is a great enabler for modders. As to the constructive part: I did make 2 constructive suggestions of which you ignored one. Already someone else posted here that it feels outdated because it lacks basic features. And it was stated in other threads over and over again.

Sorry, I am just a bit grumpy about the shortness of the newsletter. One is no news and the other one was already announced by Octopus G one or two weeks ago... Yet, zero news about the Afghanistan map update, no updates on continued work on any of the other modules released recently (Kola, Sinai, Phantom, ), no deep dive into the 2025 and Beyond video...

But I do object to the claim that my post wasn't constructive!

Edited February 14 by Sunbather

[BIGNEWY]

Just now, Sunbather said:

Sorry, I am just a bit grumpy about the shortness of the newsletter. One is no news and the other one was already announced by Octopus G one or two weeks ago... Yet, zero news about the Afghanistan map update, no updates on continued work on any of the other modules released recently (Kola, Sinai, Phantom, ), no deep dive into the 2025 and Beyond video...

We wont be able to please everyone with each newsletter, and yes this weeks news was shorter than other weeks, but hopefully we have other news that you will enjoy as the year progresses. 

Either way have a great weekend. 

[ggrewe]

Damn! At this rate we're going to OD on WWII news - please don't stop

[Sunbather]

vor 13 Minuten schrieb BIGNEWY:

but hopefully we have other news that you will enjoy as the year progresses. 

Either way have a great weekend. 

I am sure of that!

Have a great weekend, too!

[T.Power]

I hope everyone has a stress free Valentines day, don't forget, happy wife, happy life.

[Volator]

[Bucic]

ED: "we are limited to how much we can include to save hard drive space"

Heatblur in Bentusi voice: WE WILL NOT BE BOUND!

 

Seriously, I hope there's going to be some policy established in this regard. A policy that wouldn't even be needed if not for Heatblur.

Edited February 14 by Bucic

[sthompson]

3 hours ago, BIGNEWY said:

I have already requested Iraq to be added to the search list, I will remind admin again now. 

edit: plenty of work has gone into the user files, we have been maintaining it for many years, so please keep it constructive. 

thank you 

A long time ago I posted a request for more flexible filtering. In particular, since skins represent a huge percentage of the user files it would be convenient to have a mechanism to filter them out while looking at all other files relevant for a particular module. Otherwise, looking to see what is new for a given module requires skipping over many, many new skins to see if there is anything else. Right now the only way to avoid skins in the results is to pick one of the other categories and go through them one at a time.

[BIGNEWY]

1 minute ago, sthompson said:

A long time ago I posted a request for more flexible filtering. In particular, since skins represent a huge percentage of the user files it would be convenient to have a mechanism to filter them out while looking at all other files relevant for a particular module. Otherwise, looking to see what is new for a given module requires skipping over many, many new skins to see if there is anything else. Right now the only way to avoid skins in the results is to pick one of the other categories and go through them one at a time.

I will be collecting the feedback over the weekend and going over the requests to present to the team. Thank you for the feedback. 

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

On 2/14/2025 at 8:56 PM, BIGNEWY said:

I will be collecting the feedback over the weekend and going over the requests to present to the team. Thank you for the feedback. 

There's been quite a few threads already in the last few years about suggested improvements to the User Files section. I hope you take those into account as well.
Just to name one example which has been requested a lot: the ability to filter out fictional liveries...

Edited February 16 by Raven (Elysian Angel)
Typo

[MAXsenna]

There's been quite a few threads already in the last few years about suggested improvements to the User Files section. I hope you take those into account as well.
Just to name one example which has been requested a lot: the ability the filter out fictional liveries...

Was gonna say!

Sent from my SM-A536B using Tapatalk

[sirrah]

Sorry @BIGNEWY, but ED should have known this "give the user files some love" news, was going to backfire 

Here's another feature the community has been kindly asking for ever since the user files were initiated:

"Allow the content creators to receive notifications, when someone replies to their user file"

[Sunbather]

vor einer Stunde schrieb sirrah:

Sorry @BIGNEWY, but ED should have known this "give the user files some love" news, was going to backfire 

Here's another feature the community has been kindly asking for ever since the user files were initiated:

"Allow the content creators to receive notifications, when someone replies to their user file"

This seems to be a very important one that I've seen suggested many times already, even as a newcomer to DCS. It would also help to populate the comment section a bit more which is important to be able to judge if a campaign, mission, mod or whatever still works. (from my consumer perspective)

[YoYo]

In the case of User Files, the main problem I see now is the size of the file that can be uploaded. It is now 300 Mb only, which is too little. New textures often have 4K resolution and more + other files. This causes repainting to be 500 Mb sometimes if additional model elements are added. 300 Mb is simply not enough. 

The limit should be increased to 500 Mb according me.

[YoYo]

15 hours ago, Sunbather said:

Yet, zero news about the Afghanistan map update ...

The first half of the year will be a beach. Don't count on much (La-7 maybe). The earliest something will probably start to appear is around Q2 (I bet MiG-29 in June), or World War II (F6F, AI asset, Marianas map update ) maybe April/May. However, I agree about the Afghanistan map. From a period of 3 months (for the next part) it has already become a period of 8 months and this is quite strange, because during this time there was not a single update of the map. It seems that they were waiting for the release of Iraq in a new form, which was very well received. Now this technology is probably being transferred to the Afghanistan map, but here again we are talking about several months that have passed and there are still no updates. So maybe March update, I hope?