Fantastic blog post on the status of sims.

[Agiel7]

Recently, there was a blog post on my SECOND favorite clammy and dank corner of the internet, Rock Paper Shotgun, by PC Gamer UK writer Tim Stone on the decline of flight sims:

http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010...tolen-thunder/

It's an unfortunate reminder of how far our favorite game genre has falllen from titles like Jane's F-15 and Falcon 4.0 being on the cover of CGW and ostensibly being the Crysis-es of their day when it came to pushing our PC's to their absolute limit to becoming a niche genre.

Also of note the hilarious photoshopped screenshots.

Enjoy!

[Dowly]

Haha, good one!

[Schroeder]

And that's how Silent Hunter 5 was born....

[Weiss Pinguin]

Haha, I remember Air Power. Gawd that was forever ago

And that World of Tanks business looks really cool... confound this old computer...

[Oberon]

Tim Stone is a legend

[krashkart]

I see they included a screenshot from my old fave: F-117 Nighthawk. Very nice description of the Fireye. I do not remember that from the game or the manual.

Anecdote time:

I played that sim until the floppies wore out. That is to say that I brought them out of mothballs many times over the years so that I could install and play it again. A feature that was key to the simulation, and that is missing from the more modern sims that I have played, was a differentiation between pulse radar and doppler radar. You had to treat each radar site differently depending on how the signal was being sent. With one you could simply fly head on, and with the other type you had to fly perpendicular to the site. With either one you also had to maintain a fair distance to avoid detection.

I was deeply influenced by F-117. In many of the combat flight sims I've played since I still prefer to follow the terrain, although in a sim like Strike Fighters that is not always an option.

[Radioshow]

I cant into details yet, but Falcon 4.0 is still going very strong.
There is still a big sim community and work is still being done. Just wait another month or 2 at most. You wont believe your eyes.

And there is still DCS and a couple other sims being worked on.

I admit its nothing like the Janes days though.

[Arclight]

To be honest, I feel like Falcon and DCS exceed the Janes days. Well, not entirely; Longbow for example gave a "base" you could explore a bit between missions. The modern "hardcore" sims are very clinical in this: briefing > mission > debrief, no fluff.


Not that I ever got Falcon running.

[Raptor1]

Originally Posted by Arclight

To be honest, I feel like Falcon and DCS exceed the Janes days. Well, not entirely; Longbow for example gave a "base" you could explore a bit between missions. The modern "hardcore" sims are very clinical in this: briefing > mission > debrief, no fluff.


Not that I ever got Falcon running.

Falcon might not have the atmospheric fanciness, but it made up for it by having an absolutely awesome campaign engine (Something DCS better get eventually...or else!).

[Takeda Shingen]

I, too, long for the days of Janes.