This game is ludicrously hard! I'm aware thats its a simulation and not an arcade game, but this level of difficulty just takes the biscuit. The convoluted controls aren't aided by the lack of interactive tutorials, and I'm seriously struggling to fly straight and level and enter combat properly.
Any veterans with any tips? Any good joystick layouts to reccomend?

IL-2, like all hardcore sims, is its own beast requiring its own sets of skills and knowledge of "tricks". For example, most newbs who decide to fly ME109s and the like don't realize that the default cockpit view is useless for combat because of the gunsight offset (!) My recommendation is to head over to a site like www.simhq.com and check out their extensive forums for help.
Good luck and good flying

> The convoluted controls aren't aided by the lack of interactive tutorials, and I'm seriously struggling to fly straight and level and enter combat properly.
flying level just takes practice. another thing you might want to do is pick one plane (i'd suggest the la7), familiarize yourself with the cockpit and, while you're training, fly just that plane. you might want to set up a quick mission against a couple of friendly li-2's (or maybe ju-52's) and practice on shooting them down. when you feel like it you can set them up as the enemy, so they shoot back :). then, when you're confident enough, you can swap them with fighters (start with easy difficulty, then just move it up).
difficulty wise you might want to disable complex engine management - there's no need to worry about prop pitch and mixture ratios yet, imho.
a note of caution: il-2's tailgunners are frustratingly accurate: they can nail you between the eyes with one shot over a distance of 1km or more - even from a bomber that is in a flat spin :).
> This game is ludicrously hard!
il-2 is easy :). try flying the ka-50 helicopter in eagle dynamics' ka-50 black shark :).
> Any good joystick layouts to reccomend?
whatever suits you. i like to have the radiator, flaps, trim and the three view zoom levels mapped on my stick (besides the guns/bombs, obviously). you won't need much more in il-2. maybe the wheelbrake, airbrake and gear...

Take a look on the topic I created, titled "A nugget's guide to getting off the ground"... it has a link to a lot of good pointers for newcomers.
Another thing: try to fly an easy plane in the start. The La-7 is good and docile, but I'd recommend that you start with the P-39, since it has a modern 3-point landing gear configuration, making it much more forgiving on the ground. It also has great visibility, and it's generally easy to fly, so it's a good place to start learning how to fly, before you move to more difficult aircraft. Whatever you do, don't start with the P-47 or the FW-190's, or with any bombers. Those can be hard even for veterans. :-)
As to joystick layouts, it's a very personal thing. In the start, I would recommend you don't even worry about shooting; just learn to fly the plane. In that case, make sure you can control the basic controls - pitch, roll, yaw, and throttle - and learn where you can find the flap and gear controls. Then, just fly. You'll get the hang of it.
There's one other thing we could do, and that would be an online flying lesson. I might be able to do that this weekend, so let me know if you're interested, and we can set things up.
One last thing: it can be hard in the beginning, but spend some time with it and it will more than make up for the investment. ;-)

And whatever you do, just stick with it! The satisfaction and sense of achievement to be obtained from fighting in a "real sim" is immeasurably far beyond anything to be had from an arcade game. Cue all the old clichés about it being what you put into it, &c.
The only problem is that you end up being able to enjoy little else, which is a real problem in this world where combat sims are virtually not made anymore. :(

Probably a stupid question, but you are aware that you can tone down the realism, yes?

Yes, of course!
Having been brought up on Microsoft Flight Simulator, where the planes are 'pretty' simple to control, moving onto IL2, where none of the planes stay still for a second, is a bit of a shock. I find myself a little in the dark, with no idea how to manouvre in combat or fly straight and level.
I'm sure that practice is the answer, but I really don't know where to begin >.< I'll take all of your advice on board and start simple.

Civilian planes are designed to be stable and easy to fly. However, on combat planes, stability isn't good; the less stable a plane is, the more maneuverable, and maneuverability is extremely important on a fighter plane.
As I said before, try the P-39, if only for the 3-point gear you're probably used to. If you want to try a more stable plane first, you can fly with an IL-2 with no load - it's stable enough for newcomers, and it has a powerful engine, which makes things easier when you have no load.

I posted the developer suggested stick setup in this thread: http://www.gog.com/en/forum/il_2_sturmovik_1946/joystick_help
I'd also recommend turning the difficulty to the lowest settings and having a bit of fun flying around & shooting stuff (especially in quick missions, your squad against a squad of bombers is a good start). Then as you get accustomed to it, raise the settings slightly (I'd recommend avoiding complex engine management in particular, thats a puzzle game in itself) until you hit a level where challenge & fun are equally balanced.
The IL2 is also as tough a plane as you'll find in a game, you can almost ignore machinegun fire, the bullets just riccochet off unless they hit at a near right angle

I think there's a suggested joystick setup in the manual as well. Having tried one mission so far, I have issues taking off. Some reason I'm having extreme difficulty counteracting the torque from the engine and keep flying off the airfield each time... did manage to take off anyway, but gaining any type of airspeed seems difficult, let alone fighting.
Like the manual said, I'm going to start off next time creating a mission with some friendly bombers and try manuever around them and see if I can even shoot one down, and then progress to hostile things from there.

Yeah this game is pretty hard.
My biggest problem is finding the airstrip when I want to come in to land. The grass runways are barely distinguishable from standard grass imo. Is there a patch or mod to change the texture of grass runways to make them more visible?
As for my flying - it's getting there. The plane which I've found easiest to get off the ground is the Hawker Hurricane. I line up straight, engage the brakes, lock the tailwheel and throttle up to 100% before releasing the brakes and then using fine rudder control to stay straight. Then I start to pull up around 180km/h and retract the landing gear immediately or the aircraft judders all over the place.
I'm pretty good at taking off in the Ju-88 as well, even though it's a twin-engined bomber/night-fighter. I can't seem to land anything without nosing over or otherwise wrecking it though.

Not that I know of. However, you can check the map (M key, by default) to get an idea of its location.
Just keep trying, and you'll get the hang of it. Always remember to get the flaps down to landing position, and study the aircraft references, to know what is the recommended approach speed. Also, practice the "flare" (pulling the stick right before touching down)... in time, you'll master it, for most planes, at least. Some are notoriously hard to land. ;-)

When I bring up the map it's not particularly helpful - it's tiny with a low resolution and shows me very little apart from my grid ref.
I can actually land now, which is a big improvement. I've had some success landing the more forgiving carrier-borne aircraft on land, and I've managed to just about land an SBD Dauntless on a carrier (glad I remembered to use the arrestor hook or I'd have gone straight into the control tower) on my third attempt. I haven't succeeded since though - I usually come in too shallow, try to correct my mistake at the last moment and clatter into the side of the ship.
I'm guessing that once I have the basics out of the way I'll be moving on to the fun stuff - shooting down helpless bombers!
Edit: I forgot to ask - is there any way to change the measurements the game uses from metric units to Imperial/US units? It doesn't make sense for the gauges to use one system and the on screen display another.

You can change the resolution of your map with just a right click on it. You can aslo move it by draging left click.

The nice thing about IL2 is that it lets you tweak the difficulty significantly. Start on the easy settings, that will turn off the flutter affect, stalls, spins, engine management and realistic landings, so that you can really get a feel for it. Then over-time start turning things on, start with realistic landings so you can get a taste for stalling, then flutter, turbulence and all that. Finally turn on stalls and spins and complex engine management, which requires you to mind your mixtures and supercharger, and you'll be set.