You are not seriously comparing a closed environment game to an open environment game?
There are so many things wrong with the idea of comparing those I cannot find a basis to have a discussion.
Just FYI, a 5 year old Intel video chip has zero support for shaders of any kind.
Skyrim has a 16 square mile open environment, but that's not important. What's important is that it has a good multi-source lighting system, speculars, reflections, volumetrics (smoke, fog, clouds), good looking soft shadows, all in dx9.
That five year old Intel video chip would still run the game as it is now without the more advanced shaders.
Il-2 Sturmovik was launched ten years ago on November 18, 2001 and back then it looked like this:
It ran on a Pentium III with a minimum of 256MB system ram and 32MB video ram with dx8 support. Notice the nice diffused specular highlights on the cowling and the leading edge of the left wing, the beautiful volumetric clouds and sense of depth in the scene.
Aces high has better models (the updated ones), but everything else looks like I'm back on a windows 98 box in the late '90s.
I'll stop now before I aggravate anyone, but consider this a request. Please!