Caretaker

Yup it has been cancelled. There had been some shots floating around some time ago from a CFS4 pre-alpha version, which were closer to those FS X screens than to CFS3. However there's a lot more to ugrading a civilian flight sim engine to a combat sim than "just" weapons modeling - damage models, ground units, AI behaviour, special avionics for modern settings and preferably some kind of campaign system... CFS3 apparently didn't do well enough for MS for another version, even if it would have been merely an update with the engine that is developed for the civilian sim line anyway.

The biggest difference would probably be about the acceleration phase and potential energy modeling (read: gravity) for missiles. Both is rather simplified currently in Lock On, so I'd expect missile range of planes flying high and fast would increase, while those of low and slow flying planes would decrease. Certainly a welcome improvement in my book. There are however lots of aspects to the whole weapons modeling area, and I guess it's safe to say that some but not all of the improvements that ED plans will already make it into 1.2 :)

You forgot the dynamic campaign which, although limited in scope compared to similar attempts like Falcon4, Rowan's BoB or EECH, had the unique feature of working fine right out of the box without requiring the developers to go bankrupt first and have the community fix it a few years later... :p

Traditionally dynamic mesh algorithms work poorly for object models; it's usually better to provide predefined LOD models and switch at a certain distance. For terrain rendering though it's already a standard (used in Lock On as well). As for reinventing the wheel, this is what Michelin proposes for the future: http://www.motorintro.com/reportajes/_imagesreportajes/michelin_tweel/michelin_tweel07.jpg http://www.geocities.com/tiensoon_law/images/blog_michelin_tweel_02.jpg Seems to have its advantages (higher resistance to damage as no air can be lost); too bad it looks ugly ;)

I've never been a big fan of the FS series either, simply for a lack of action ;) It's nice to fly around a bit from time to time, but most areas I was interested in lacked accuracy, and I didn't feel like spending more money to get all the various addon sceneries for that. The graphics engine in particular was disappointing, ground detail lacked texture resolution and object density to be convincing. These shots however, even though they are a clear evolution of the FS2004 engine, seem to approach a level that is really stunning now. Some textures still look a bit rough, but that is apparently offset by an amazing amount of 3D objects like houses and trees. Now I guess most sim engines could theoretically add such objects; Lock On itself isn't too bad with that ;) The biggest issue is certainly placing all that stuff on the map, something that can hardly be done manually in a reasonable timeframe. I guess what MS has done is to improve their scene generation scripts considerably, which is very interesting. I think automatic map generation is an imporant area for any future flight sim to reduce the time required to build new maps. No doubt you'll need a killer system to run this, or it won't be that different from how FS2004 looks. But I expect the same will be true for future sims by ED :)

The Ka-50's systems should provide lots of funky autopilot modes that make life easier for the pilot - like automatically aligning the helicopter with a target that the pilot acquires with his HMD. At least that's what I've read some time ago; however I have no clue to what degree these modes are really integrated with the real helicopter and not just development proposals that turned into an official featurelist somehow... ;) I am wondering how much the development requirements for the Ka-50 (and Mi-28) were incorporating NOE and popup attack strategies, which obviously make it harder to concentrate both on flying and attacking for a single pilot. I think the Russian army was sticking much longer to a doctrine that used helicopters (mainly the Mi-24) for high-speed dive attacks, not unlike what the Ah-56 Cheyenne should have been. In that role, a second crew member wouldn't be as necessary. Will be interesting to see how this will turn out. I still remember various Longbow II missions where I crashed into some hill on my way back (usually after an extremely successful mission) because I lost concentration for just a second ;)

Mounting it closer to the helicopter's center of gravity should also reduce the effect of recoil and increase accuracy when firing.

Doesn't it get a bit boring over the years? ;) Now, I totally understand why nobody likes the F-22. I don't like it either :p For 90 years now we've had all these classic matches - Spad vs. Fokker, Spitfire vs. Messerschmitt, Wildcat vs. Zero, Sabre vs. MiG-15, Phantom vs. MiG-21... and the F-22 is really the first in this line that simply does not have an opponent on the "other side". Makes for some very unbalanced gameplay in a flight sim indeed :p The F-22 is the climax of this development that started 90 years ago, and I don't have the slightest doubt that it is way ahead of any other plane in its primary role - simply because no other plane has been developed with the same combination of low observability, performance, the latest sensor and weapons technology and the integration into the overall force network. We can discuss all day whether some of these features are not so important in certain situations, but that doesn't change the fact that this should be a killer combination, even if maybe not everything works quite as perfect as advertised. And if it will never be needed, all the better - nobody's really looking forward to a conflict where the US F-15 fleet would not be sufficient to gain air superiority.

Oh, it has. Lots of smaller improvements already that aren't always too obvious, and of course there are still enough issues left. But there's progress. Take 1.11 for example: finally ground units don't suffer the "exclusive targeting" issue anymore, when only one object of a group would fire at one enemy unit. Previously, it didn't make a difference if you flew over one Shilka or a group of 10 - only one would fire at you anyway. Try it with 1.11 now, quite a difference ;) Apart from such issues, it's the "strategic behaviour" that bothers me (but that's an issue in pretty much every sim). Stuff like making a CAP flight aware of enemy SAM sites is very hard to code, which is why I really prefer to have triggers to control that (like having such a flight break off the pursuit of enemy planes if they fly too far away from their waypoint).

Not that simple I'm afraid ;) LUA scripts would have to be integrated a lot more into the whole framework compated to now. Still lots of work to do for the devs - just consider the impact of dynamic object additions at mission runtime for the track recorder for example. Not that this couldn't be solved, but there are certainly more dependencies that make this complicated :) Not that I wouldn't love to have it though ;) Scripting possibilities to determine AI decision makings would be a dream come true for me. Combined with randomization options, that would already go a long way in creating the dynamic environment we're talking about here. What's special about Falcon4's dynamic campaign is that it's running in real-time, and that it can cope with much larger amounts of units overall. The first point is more of a luxury to me that isn't really required for a dynamic campaign anyway. The second point of course makes quite a difference but isn't trivial to implement. Even such a "bubble" system for simplified calculation of AI behaviour isn't really mandatory for a DC, but the scope of missions is reduced a lot without it. With a mission system as dynamic as in Jane's F/A-18, and a way to automatically create such dynamic missions by analyzing the last mission's results, we'd have all tools needed to generate a mission/campaign system in a league of its own. If you add in events like sound file playback options, even things like complex ATC or real FAC operations could be produced entirely by us without ED having to take care of this... ;)

I know :) I was only commenting on SHTOPOR's previous remark that Lock On should have a dynamic campaign because Falcon4 already had one in 1998. If it was that easy, then consequently the same could be demanded from XSI. Neither ED nor XSI can however compete with the manpower that Microprose could throw at the Falcon4 development, and even then did the campaign leave a lot to be desired initially, and required additional years of community development to work as intended.

Haven't flown the Eagle too intensively since the good old Jane's F-15E days... sounds like this is about to change soon ;) Thanks already to everyone involved with that project!

It had been renamed from "F-22" to "F/A-22" already to underline its "multirole" capabilities ;) Now I don't doubt that it may be a more capable bomber than the F-117 (in fact if it's as stealthy than there's no doubt it's the better choice to drop JDAMs with), but nevertheless this was more of a marketing move towards the congress people who sit on the budgets... The "A" suffix in turn should be pretty normal, standard for every first production version?

Open architecture doesn't come for free however. Setting up a generic interface powerful enough to allow adding new planes complete with new avionics is a very hard task that so far has never been done in the world of combat flight simulations, for a reason ;) And wouldn't your former argument that Falcon4 had a dynamic campaign already in 1998 apply to Fighter Ops as well then...? ;) You seem to think ED doesn't really care about the sims they produce. Now I don't like each and every design decision in Lock On either, but I tend to think that producing flight sims isn't exactly the most profitable way to spend your programming skills on these days, so rest assured that the people who still do it have a certain passion about it - that apparently includes the Fighter Ops people as well. It's just that you won't see the multi-million dollar budgets from the past that went into sims like Falcon4 anymore, and that certainly does have its implications on the resources that can be spent on further development. I'm looking forward to what Fighter Ops and also Jet Thunder (another "independent" project that looks very nice so far) will turn out to be; however I don't expect them to be the perfect sims that leave nothing to be desired either.

The terrain mesh isn't really superior either I think: http://www.global-scenery.org/new_zealand/pictures/newzealand_30.html

Hehe not really... sometimes I surprise myself :p

Hmm I was never the biggest fan of using photorealistic textures, mainly because the resolution was horrible when flying low. This really seems to be changing now though. Many screens still lack resolution there, but not as much as with previous X-Plane terrains. And it should still be possible to use multi-texturing like Lock On does, to get additional detail down low. Now add some real 3D objects and you get some damn nice scenery... ;) Really great stuff; I have a feeling the RAM requirements for such a huge, high-resolution, non-repeating texture is incredibly high, but then again Lock On isn't easy in that regard either.

I had the opportunity to try a headset some years ago with 1024x768 resolution and a 60° field of view. That's much more than what your standard 30°/800x600 VR headset provides these days (it was used by BMW's research facility and came with a pricetag of over 100.000 € back then ;)), but it still wasn't really a satisfactory experience regarding the immersion factor. Sure it was cool, but the tunnel vision effect was still very evident and annoying. Oh and it was damn heavy and hard to wear for >10 minutes :p I don't think these devices really make sense without at least 90° field of view, and an appropriate resolution of at least 1280x960 or something in that range. That's about what I have with my screen here, and I wouldn't want to go any lower - too bad no affordable headset with such capabilities seems to be in sight...

Hmm many people in the Falcon community see this addon policy as the opposite: more like a closedown of independent 3rd party development. In the end it's not really different to what ED are already doing with some 3D models (you send them in, and ED will try to incorporate them into the official release versions). Some weapons have already found their way into the sim, and I'm curious to see what will happen with the various plane models we've already seen. Overall I agree that Lock On could use the injection of more 3rd party work, there's just too much talent out there as proven with other sims. New 3D models and especially new maps/theatres are time-consuming tasks that shouldn't really touch the inner workings of the code (well in some parts that still seems to be the case unfortunately ;)) and would ideally be done by independent developers. But still, don't forget that even with the source code available, people never really produced new avionics or physics models for Falcon4. Had Microprose continued the development as planned, chances are we'd have gotten various "true" addon planes already. The release of the source code was a good thing to happen, but only after the dev team had already abandoned it. I hope that won't ever be necessary for Lock On :)

"No problems" is hardly what I'd use to describe the state of our Phantom fleet here :D The list of restrictions on how to handle them is probably longer than the flight manual. That we still stick with them and gave the MiGs away was not because of the maintenance situation - acquisition of spare parts is even harder for the Phantoms these days than it ever was for the MiGs, and they've been downgraded for years now as well. On the other hand, consider how much US planes are still flying in countries like Iran (where the spare parts situation apparently isn't too great either). Doesn't seem like those planes are useless in less-than-perfect conditions either. The Apache apparently had a rather low flight rate in Desert Storm due to the relatively harsh environment (from what I remember). Then again they were the first units that entered enemy airspace and fired the first shots, and their record in that conflict isn't considered bad at all to my knowledge. Certainly nothing that proves helicopters are useless. As for whether the Ka-50 is the best choice for an addon, we can discuss this all day long ;) Keep in mind that there's always a bunch of reasons behind such a decision. There aren't too many Su-25T's around either in the end, an addition that also didn't enhance the dogfight environment in Lock On too much and - just like the Ka-50 - really shouldn't fly around in areas of enemy air superiority. Still a nice addon overall, at least in my view :)

"I don't have Falcon 4, so I can't comment on their A-10 flight model. I do have LOMAC, and their A-10 flight model is the best I've ever experienced in a computer sim. That said, in LOMAC a fully loaded A-10 is too slow on the deck. In Europe, (sea level and cool) we could routinely fly low-level at high gross weights at 360 KIAS. The LOMAC hog will only go about 320. If I recall correctly, the LOMAC world is hotter than a standard day -- which may account for some of it. At Nellis in August (high and hot), 320 KIAS was about the best you could hope for." http://www.simhq.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=37;t=005922 So much for the various internet FM experts. Sorry that I take a real life A-10 pilot's opinion over that any day. No offense Gambit, but I also think it's questionable that you feel qualified to comment on Lock On's "realism" (quite a broad term actually, but it's not uncommon that it's used in such a meaningless way as you do) when you were recently surprised that the A-10 doesn't even have a radar. There's nothing wrong with not liking LOMAC, it certainly does have its shortcomings. But if you start a discussion about that, at least make sure you know what you're talking about :)

It underlines the importance of marketing :) While reliable numbers are hard to get (not sure how reliable those above are?), Falcon4 (the original one) has a reputation for being the most successful combat flight sim ever sales-wise (with certainly several hundreds of thousands of copies sold). I have no doubt that the extensive marketing campaign contributed a lot to that - they even ran TV ads, something that is still rather uncommon for computer games (well, at least around here ;)).

Glad you guys like it...! Yeah I wondered as well to be honest... mostly time issues due to the job, and some not so pleasant family issues that kept me occupied. I have a few days off at the moment and thought that would be a good opportunity to start posting again. As for the glider flying, I'm still thinking about acquiring a license, but at the moment - again due to time constraints - it's not really an option. I think without being able to pursue it on a regular basis, it doesn't make too much sense - then again that may change again until next year, so who knows ;) Anyway, I sure had to try it once! I did, but only on the last flight; too bad the pilot said he didn't have a license for that yet (then again, maybe I was lucky...). First two flights were more about getting used to it and trying some stuff myself. And they were over so quickly in the end (some 45-60 minutes each, but it feels much shorter up there) that I actually forgot about asking for some aerobatics... ;) I really only had some tight turns, not sure about the acceleration... felt cool though! :) Some aerobatics are on the list for the next flight... sounds like quite a ride though from what you describe! It's remarkable what some people are doing with unpowered planes anyway... ;) Of course that winch start I had some weeks before was yet another dimension. That thing pulled us into the air so violently that I was sure I was going to die! :) I know what you mean :) The confusion when your stomach tells you something different than your eyes about where "below" is, is also something you have to experience first (no matter how often you read about it before). I wasn't sure how well I'd take it anyway; fortunately that wasn't much of an issue (well the 2nd flight was actually very turbulent, and I was a bit shaky when climbing out of the cockpit, but nothing serious...). It's a pity that these aspects of flying can never be replicated in sims that way (I don't expect someone to invent an artifical gravity device in time... :p). In a real plane, just doing a simple turn is something exciting that way. And you sure are more afraid of crashing without a respawn button :p As BGP explained, it's not that expensive; in Germany you can often join a club which makes it even cheaper. It's more the time investment that I'm concerned about. Flight sims require slightly less organisational effort :) As for the collapsing wing, well, the day before I went flying there, they had the first midair collision since over 30 years :o Both planes came down safely fortunately, but it was a nice introduction during the morning's briefing as that accident was analyzed in quite some detail... in fact it really gave me a strange feeling whenever another plane was in sight at about the same altitude... getting an idea of spotting other planes in a real plane was also interesting BTW :) sure, but I was actually surprised how close Lock On already is. The landscape colours, the weather... well apparently still some way to go, but we've come a long way since Flanker 1.0 ;) Sounds cool... good luck with that flight! A workmate of mine is working as a freelance photographer for AP, and already made some trips to Afghanistan. Some weeks ago he was called on short notice and was able to fly there with the US military for some press event... in a C-17, complete with midair refuelling which he was allowed to watch from the cockpit :) Must have been a scary experience as well according to him... still have to ask him for his photos of that though. I'll try to post them here if he doesn't mind. Cheers,

Some do (Rowan's Battle of Britain or Razorwork's EECH have gone open source), but TK with Strike Fighters is actually not one of them. It's still a very open engine for sure, but core features for weapons and avionics modeling, AI behaviour and the graphics engine have to be developed by TK himself, not the community. That's why people were eagerly awaiting patches with new features like chaff/flares or the capability to display HUDs (and especially various fixes, because for sure the initial release versions were not exactly polished...). I think it's quite a remarkable project overall considering that it's basically one person only who develops the engine, but that does of course limit the progress. No question though, there's some amazing 3rd party work available, as the SimHQ article points out. Seeing that you should be able to get it very cheap, it can't hurt to check it out (just be careful with Ebay; you risk buying one of the "Walmart versions", which are horrible and cannot be patched!). Just be aware of its limitations. The planes and effects are nice overall, but the terrain is rather dull (best suited for desert theatres ;)). The campaigns, although dynamic, are a bit repetetive as well for my taste (haven't played it for many months now, so not sure what the current state is there). As for multiplayer, I guess as usual with modded sims, there's quite a bit of coordination required to get to the same standard when flying with someone else. And about the realism question: it has never been advertised as a "hardcore" sim anyway, and the avionics are certainly pretty generic. Best suited for some prop flying or 50s-60s jets; if you don't mind to have a generic 60s era radar in your Hornet or F-15 and no MFDs or IR displays, then that can be fun as well. Just don't expect Falcon4-level avionics there.