Great news for the hardcore sim market...

[SUBS17]

I agree combining good graphics with a DC is the ultimate and both FC and AF are the best thats available at the moment.

[GGTharos]

Actually, the old TORNADO game kicked the living daylights out of certain Falcon aspects (specifically, the planning, briefing, debriefing, ingress and egress SHORAD IIRC and so on)

[Weta43]

My personal feeling is that as these are FLIGHT simulators and so the flight models are the most important thing. As someone in a previous post mentioned a flight model that is like travelling on a rollercoaster might be an engrossing combat simulator, but it’s not a good flight simulator.

It should feel like you’re flying something…

After that, immersion in the game comes from a combination of good graphics, smooth game play, good physics (i.e. realistically behaving (even where not matching any specific real model) weapons and radar etc. ), AI (when playing against AI) that behave intelligently, and enough random variation between missions and replays of the same mission for things not to get too familiar or stale.

The question of how many buttons you have to click, or whether you have to use buttons on the keyboard or mouse them on the screen is secondary. If you play the game often enough to get any good at it it’s all going to have to be second nature anyway.

For me once you get the physics right to a certain point the whole 5 buttons vs. 40 clicks thing is (as the “Hard Core” thing implies) a bit of a who’s got the biggest dick thing (It takes 40 hours for it all to become second nature in my simulator, but it only takes 10 in yours !)

My 20 cents worth (used to be 5 cents, but that’s inflation for you).

[bflagg]

If you lot & Eagle wanted an immersive environment, you'd be flying in one today. What you have now is what you asked for - a visually stunning flight simulator.

 

The fact that so few of you are capable of looking beyond the immediate visuals (which btw are far from bad in F4:AF), really says it all. I could tell you that once you take off in a fully simulated war, you don't have the TIME nor the inclination to pay any attention to the visuals, because you are too busy sorting out radar returns and trying to make your assigned target on time and in one piece. But clearly that holds absolutely no value here - cause you simply aren't interested in that type of simulator.

 

Oh god. this crap again...?

Yes F4 is cool and very immersive that LockON can't touch...

Yes LockON is cool also in other ways.

 

Both different.

Both cool.

 

I have complaints for both types....but y'know what?

It's a phreakin game!

 

Life? Get it?

 

sheezh!

[eXor]

My personal feeling is that as these are FLIGHT simulators and so the flight models are the most important thing. As someone in a previous post mentioned a flight model that is like travelling on a rollercoaster might be an engrossing combat simulator, but it’s not a good flight simulator.

It should feel like you’re flying something…

 

Even if it is meant to feel like "travelling on a rollercoaster"? I guess those multi million dollar F-16 simulators must be modelling the FM incorrectly. Real F-16 pilots ( and laymen who have been lucky enough to get some stick time in a real simulator ) give the FM a thumbs up. I guess they are all lying/biased.

[Weta43]

Planes all designed with the INTENTION of flying like they're a rollercoaster...

 

Lying - no I don't believe so.

 

Biased ? I've yet to read a post here that wasn't biased one way or the other ( my own included ) & my guess is that pilots who fly F16's (or SU27's etc.) have more emotional attachment to their plane than most of us & want to see it portrayed in the best possible light (assuming they're not still on active duty & perhaps obligated to do so).

 

You can pull a lot of G's in a plane, but those little clouds that form over the wings at high angles of attack are an indication that the plane is no longer moving "straight" through the air, but slipping downward through the air (relative to the planes axis) fast enough to drop the pressure over the wing. If you get an F16 to an AOA where those cloud would form, then at that point you're not on a rollercoaster anymore (for an ingame example you can feel it on the SU25 / 25T when you pull up heavily loaded from a dive - admittedly at about 3 - 4 G rather than 7 - 9 G, but the ideas the same).

It's just the physics of it...

[Pilotasso]

Actually, the old TORNADO game kicked the living daylights out of certain Falcon aspects (specifically, the planning, briefing, debriefing, ingress and egress SHORAD IIRC and so on)

 

Yeah! LOL I still have Tornado's game box just beahind me as I write these lines. That thing was hard! My favourite missions were striking heavily defended targets where I had to plan each fighters attack route, from several different directions silmultaneously. I've always been a dogfighter and a multirole junkie but I liked alot when all hell broke loose when I reached within miles of the targets. Tracers and missile warnings, and then my ALARMS would drop out of their pre planned launch to kill the bateries firing at me. Death from above! I would see a flash in the dark and magicaly the thing would go silent...sexy. on the other hand I hated to encounter any hostile fighter. Even a Mig-31 was extremely hard to outmanuever. That was the only let down of the whole game...I had to blast enemy fighters from frontal engagements or I would be toast.

[SUBS17]

Planes all designed with the INTENTION of flying like they're a rollercoaster...

 

Lying - no I don't believe so.

 

Biased ? I've yet to read a post here that wasn't biased one way or the other ( my own included ) & my guess is that pilots who fly F16's (or SU27's etc.) have more emotional attachment to their plane than most of us & want to see it portrayed in the best possible light (assuming they're not still on active duty & perhaps obligated to do so).

 

You can pull a lot of G's in a plane, but those little clouds that form over the wings at high angles of attack are an indication that the plane is no longer moving "straight" through the air, but slipping downward through the air (relative to the planes axis) fast enough to drop the pressure over the wing. If you get an F16 to an AOA where those cloud would form, then at that point you're not on a rollercoaster anymore (for an ingame example you can feel it on the SU25 / 25T when you pull up heavily loaded from a dive - admittedly at about 3 - 4 G rather than 7 - 9 G, but the ideas the same).

It's just the physics of it...

 

If you want you can always ask a real F-16 pilot and see if your theory is correct!

http://fighterops.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=42

[Weta43]

If you look at the thread "Effects in lockon(56K warning)" there's several photos of F15's pulling G's. The one with the word Shinobi on it shows clearly that the flow over the plane is not along the axis of the plane & that the pressure drop extends away from the plane in the direction of the airflow (I'd guess that's what the vents through the fuselage are for on the F18 - to allow air to flow through to equalise pressure on the "downwind" side of the plane during high AOA manouvers). You can also see at the wingtips that the vortxes coming of the wingtips don't go straight back, but slightly up relative to the plane. If you ever see that off a viper (except during transition to supersonic flight) it's "slipping" through the air & would appear to be doing so from the plane (no longer going where the plane is pointing but moving downwards towards the gear)

[leafer]

Weta43,

 

Are you an employee at 'the' Weta workshop? If so and you can't tell me, I just wanted to say, WOW! :D

[Weta43]

Sub17 Try

 

http://www.f-16.net/f-16_photos_album64-photoavq.html

 

for a picture of an F16 slipping while pulling G's

 

 

Leafer - No - I did work as an extra on lord of the rings, & (Seperately) was offered a job making weapons for the films, but the Weta bit is just a bit like the Moose thing for Canadians...

[leafer]

I wasn't trying to offend you. Just thought you were an animator at Weta. anyway...

 

Cheers :D

[Weta43]

No - it's OK - I'm not offended -just at work & being brief. A better photo of that F16 slipping through the air in an un-rollercoaster like fashion:

http://www.f-16.net/f-16_photos_album64-photoazl.html

[SUBS17]

Sub17 Try

 

http://www.f-16.net/f-16_photos_album64-photoavq.html

 

for a picture of an F16 slipping while pulling G's

 

 

Leafer - No - I did work as an extra on lord of the rings, & (Seperately) was offered a job making weapons for the films, but the Weta bit is just a bit like the Moose thing for Canadians...

 

So have you asked any F-16 pilots yet? I'll give you the same answer to this that I gave on the UBI forum:

"Pete "Boomer" Bonanni was one of the F-16 pilots that helped create Falcon 4. And he did a brilliant job considering the types of hardware that Falcon was made to run on. If you ask a real F-16 pilot which flight sim really simulates the F16 properly they are likely to say F4. If you read the F4 Binder you'll see that the training is done by Pete Bonanni and its brilliant. The modeling of full departure and recovery are quite well done as is the use of weapons right down to mastering the landing. You can't knock Falcon 4, it was well made with good advice from the right people and thats why its still so popular today."

[leafer]

I don't think anyone here is 'knocking' F4. It just that some of the F4 members seem to like looking down their large nostrils at other sims; LOMAC in paarticuliar. They must feel threaten by it and ED's up coming sim which WILL include advanced avionics as well as flight models. And yeah, it's pretty freaking annoying and I tried to avoid these nerds most of the time.

 

Anyway, from what I've been reading, ED put a lot more effort into the actual working of the radar while Microprose focuses on button pushing and dynamic campaign. Btw, are you sure F4 is the only sim that simulates F4 properly? I have Back to Baghdad and it seems to do a pretty dang good job with avionics and flight models, and it's made by the people that worked on real F16 simulator; not game company.

[Weta43]

No - I'm not knocking F4. just saying that (except at very high speed) if you pull hard back on the stick & the plane is still going right where the nose is pointed then the FM is missing something, which is why I posted those links, particularly the second, where you can see that the plane ( an F16 with the stick back) is moving in a direction about 25 degrees below the nose of the plane. It's the same for any plane, 'cause air just isn't dense enough to push a moving jet around a corner without some slip, & the lower the speed, the higher the AOA has to be (& the greater the slip ) to generate the same forces.

I just had another look through that very interesting article leafer posted a link to (good find!) & according to that pilot "a Viper has a 25-degree AoA limiter built into its software", so there will be occasions where the plane is pointing in a direction 25 degrees away from the direction it is travelling in.

[ObvilionLost]

I dont know what everybody think bu i like this game. Graphics are not always important for games. :icon_jook Graphics should be second thing after gameplay not the first ;)