When it comes to the currently available mods that DCS:World has there are only a few that have become so feature-rich that at least to me they are at the same level of some of the paid modules out there. One of these is the A-4E-C Community mod which was a collaborative effort between community members from different communities that united to make the Scooter fly in the skies of DCS:World. One of these developers is Heclak, with which I had the pleasure to have today's interview talking about the Skyhawk's latest update, the difficulty of being a modder for DCS and the possible future of the project. Many thanks to Heclak for letting me have this chat with him! To start with, could you introduce yourself and the work you have done before entering the A-4E-C mod team. Hi. I’m Heclak and one of the current developers on the Community A-4E project. Working on the A-4E-C is my first time modding for DCS World. However, I do have prior experience in programming and 3D modelling which I had picked up in my personal time. For how long have you been a part of the A-4E-C team and how many members does the team have right now? I’ve been working on the Community A-4E project in an unofficial capacity since it first officially released in November 2018. I started by releasing an unofficial patch for the A-4E-C to add more accurate rocket capabilities and later improving the weapon systems capabilities of the A-4E as a contributor to the project. I was invited to be part of the official developer team at the end of March 2019 and have continued working on the A-4E-C every since. The A-4E-C currently consists of Plusnine and myself as the official developer team but we would not have been able to accomplish what we have done if not for the support from the community members. Especially the community testers on our discord channel who have been providing valuable feedback and testing before each public release. Modding in DCS has been a hot topic as of late due to many popular mods that have stopped working due to changes in DCS' way to handle anti-piracy measures. Has this affected the A-4E-C as a project in any way? Thankfully the A-4E-C had not been affected by the changes, this is due to the A-4E-C being a standalone module and does not require any modifications to the DCS core files nor does it require the use of any files from other modules. One of the key goals for the A-4E-C was to be a fully standalone module so that there are no prerequisites for using it. This would allow anyone to hop into the A-4E-C as the only requirement is DCS World which is free. Congratulations on the release of v1.4 of the Scooter! What do you consider to be the most relevant improvements made to the mod since its v1.3.1 release? I have been asked this question a lot and I have always struggled with answering this question as there are simply so many changes in the version 1.4 patch. The version 1.4 patch is a patch that includes a wide variety of improvements across all aspects of the aircraft. While a number of the changes are not immediately obvious, we feel that version 1.4 provides a layer of polish to the A-4E-C with the upgrades and bug fixes. The visual fixes and upgrades in both the cockpit and external models, especially with the improved lighting, provide a more immersive experience for the pilot. Various systems such as the electronic countermeasures (ECM) panel and navigation system were further developed. One of my favourite but least visible upgrade is how the underlying hydraulics and electrical system were revisited to better model the intricacies of the system so that we can simulate emergency procedures. You will need to know which subsystems can be powered by the ram air turbine and how to use the emergency systems to land safely on the ground. How hard has it been to maintain the Scooter flight-worthy in DCS? Were there any moments in which you have been frustrated by the constant fix-break cycle that happens when working in the Open Beta version of DCS? Maintaining and improving the A-4E-C certainly has its challenges as we have been doing it without official support from Eagle Dynamics. We do not get advance information about changes to the way DCS works, which require us to react after a new version of DCS has been publicly released. We are affected in a very different manner when compared to the official modules as we use different parts of the DCS system. The A-4E-C uses the Lua application programming interface (API) of DCS World which the official modules have been using much less of in recent years. A lot of these functions could be considered legacy by Eagle Dynamics and we have had challenges in getting support when a code function is not doing what it is supposed to be doing as it doesn’t affect any of the official modules. One example is the Standard Flight Model (SFM) system in the DCS World core. I believe the last official aircraft that used it was the C-101 and the Hawk before they had implemented their EFM. There has been an outstanding bug where the nose landing gear sinks into the ground when the aircraft is loaded from specific start scenarios. Since this issue does not affect any of the paid modules, we have been having trouble getting traction for getting it fixed. There have been several close calls were the A-4E-C would have seen an end-of-life situation due to DCS changes but they were thankfully mitigated. We hope to not encounter such situations in the future as it does give us a heart attack when it happens. Have the lighting changes in DCS affected the A-4E-C? Could you show us what improvements are being made to accommodate this new lighting system? There were several changes to the light rendering in the DCS 2.5.6.50726 Open Beta, one of these changes was a change in one of the shader which was often used for warning lights and annunciators. I have been told by some of the official 3rd-party developers via a reply on a Reddit post that the particular shader has mostly likely been deprecated. Fixing this has involved an updating of the model to use a different shader to render the lighting and it has been looking great again. Since the light rendering in DCS World 2.5.6 is a moving target, it has also required us to make constant brightness changes to the lighting effects to the cockpit lighting. Our biggest concern is having to release too many small patches which would trouble the users to make constant manual updates to their installation. I have taken the opportunity to give the lighting in the cockpit another upgrade with the new shader effects and adding more lighting-related features that are found in the real A-4E. In an upcoming patch, the dimming wheel on the Angle-of-Attack (AOA) indexer will allow the dimming of the AOA indexer for night flying and some of the annunciators will switch to a dim mode when the cockpit lights are set up for night flights. The lights in their dim state will be more difficult to observe just like the real aircraft. These will more accurately reflect the pilot experience in different lighting conditions. Do you think that ED's way to handle modding has been flawed? What do you think could be done to improve this situation? Wow. This is a tough question. I think this topic is far too difficult and complicated to be answered here. This is a multi-tiered situation which requires addressing numerous aspects and it would not be correct to trivialize in a simple reply. I wouldn’t describe Eagle Dynamic’s approach as flawed as I have always been under the impression that they do not really take a clear stand towards modding so it would not be fair to say if the current situation is flawed or not. I do wish that they would support the creation and use of mods in a more proactive fashion, particularly with a public release of the entire software development kit (SDK)that the official 3rd-parties have access to. That approach would be in line with the overall flight simulation community but I understand that they also have their business interests to protect. I hope that there can be a mutually beneficial approach in the near future. Last but not least. Will the A-4E-C continue to be supported in the future as long as you and the team are available to work on it? Are there any features you would personally like to add to the module later on? Our goal is to keep the project running for as long as we can and one of the things that we have done to work towards that goal is to put the files on a community repository like Github where everyone can see the development progress and contribute if they wish to. We have facilitated the creation of an active community on our discord channel where numerous A-4E users have contributed in many ways from research, testing, mission creation, community-help, and even fixes to the A-4E-C. We are working with some members of the community to create more liveries and missions for the A-4E-C. We would like to encourage more people to contribute to the project if they can, especially in the development of the module itself so that it can continue to be the community module that it started as. We believe that there are many talented members of the community who can help take the A-4E-C to greater heights and us as the development team can play the role of facilitators for that process. My most desired feature to add would be radios as that would allow for air-to-air refueling, intercoms and radio communications but that is simply not possible without the SDK, so I have put that goal aside at the moment. For now, I am just slowly making my way through the different systems as I learn more about the aircraft. There are many sub-systems that can still benefit from more research and improvements and I would like to keep working on them to create a really polished module for the community. About the interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

A complete guide on how to build a DIY head-tracking setup, from start to finish. In twelve years of playing flight simulation games, I have only experienced a couple of hardware upgrades that have truly reshaped the way I played. The first one was when I started using a joystick. The second one when I replaced my joystick with a HOTAS (Hands on Throttle and Stick) and the third is when I built my own head tracking equipment. These are changes so substantial that I could never find myself going back to my old ways ever again. I had known about head tracking ever since I saw a video from one of the YouTubers I followed, Ralfidude, in which he talked about his TrackIR setup and my mind was blown. I knew that motion tracking/capture existed but seeing it in action made me want to use one instantly. I went to see how much it cost, realized that it was way over my budget and told myself that I was never going to get one. The situation stayed the same until I started seeing some people building their own head-tracking systems. This reignited my interest in the topic, pushing me to start my research into what materials I needed. In this article I will share the results of that investigation and the process I had to follow to build the system I currently use with as much detail as possible so that you can build your own. STEP 1: UNDERSTANDING THE TECH AND YOUR NEEDS Before we get deeper into the building process we must first take a look into what this tech is really all about and the build alternatives you have at your disposal. In layman's terms this is basic motion tracking technology. The software has been designed to track a specific pattern of identifiable points to determine the position of your head in a 3D environment. It transmits said position to the game of your preference if it has head-tracking support. This is usually done with an Infrared (IR) sensitive camera and a tracker which emits an IR signal, be it self-powered (IR LEDs) or through the use of IR reflective surfaces. TYPES OF TRACKERS There are two types of trackers that have become the most popular options for gaming related applications. These are clips and caps. Clips are usually self-powered trackers that come in a vertical 3 point layout comprised of three IR LEDs. These are pretty popular for their self-powered nature and ease of use. Caps are usually powerless trackers that come in a variety of arrangements but usually they use two or more reflective surfaces which don't require power to work. The main aspect of the cap-type trackers is that they are always mounted on top a cap to allow for ease of use. WHICH TRACKER TYPE SHOULD YOU BUILD? Clips usually offer the most consistent and stable experience when compared to caps. By virtue of being self-powered it becomes a little harder to build as you have to design your clip layout and your circuit. There's always the option of 3D printing an opensource file to use as a base. You will always have to solder your own electronics so please keep that in mind. If you don't posses any experience dealing with electrical circuits, then a cap-type tracker would be your best alternative and one that would give you a similar if not indistinguishable experience. This guide will follow the process of building a clip, so if you are going to build a cap you can go directly to step five for software configuration. STEP 2: PREPARATION The entire set up will consist of a PlayStation 3 Eye camera (PS3 Eye Camera), which we will modify to turn it into an IR sensitive camera, and a simple clip-type tracker which will be a basic 3v circuit. DISCLAIMER: I am not an electrical engineer, so please take caution with the procedures that will be described in the following paragraphs. Safety first. Manage your tools correctly and take the necessary safety measures to ensure that. TOOLS You will need these tools to continue forward as they are crucial for everything we will do. Hot glue gun Solder iron Electrical solder and flux Xacto knife or equivalent Patience, a lot of patience MATERIALS For the clip we will be building a simple 3 volt parallel circuit with three IR LEDs connected to a CR2032 battery. Be careful with the ones you buy since this could cause the circuit to not work. You will need: One (1) CR2032 PCB Battery Holder. Three (3) IR LEDs rated at 3v. One (1) 6 pin push switch (Mini DPDT Push Switch). At least three (3) meters/nine (9) feet of UL2468 cable . Three (3) meters/nine (9) feet of 1mm steel wire. One (1) 2mm thick balsa wood plank. Electrical tape. You will also need a PS3 Camera which can be found for cheap and a floppy disk, but we will go more in-depth on that during step four. STEP 3 (1): BUILD THE FRAME Now it is time to build and for that we will be using the following printable template: In the first step we will cut away the two balsa wood sections and bend the wire frame using the template. Now apply glue to the bottom wooden section with your hot glue gun and adhere the bended wire frame to it. Make sure that the frame is straight as any excessive bends will affect the usability of it. Before it dries, apply glue to the top wooden section and adhere it in place. Let the glue dry a bit. The frame is done! The frame will also need a base to be held on your headphones but that one will be up to your design as each frame will have minor differences that have to be taken into account. STEP 3 (2): WIRE THE CIRCUIT To start, let's have a look at the electrical diagram of the clip that we will be building: A very simple parallel circuit with a switch and 3 LEDs, as you can see. Since we will be using 3 volt LEDs this circuit doesn't need any kind of resistor, making everything easier. The layout will be a little more like this: The process will be quite simple, but have patience: Cover the tips of the frame's legs with electrical tape before soldering to avoid any kind of undesirable contact later on. We will be soldering a bit so please do educate yourself on how to solder first. Measure using your wires the length you will need according to your frame's dimensions. Since each frame might have slightly different dimensions I won't give any measures whatsoever. You will need the following cables: (It is recommended that you cut them a bit longer what you will need since mistakes do happen and it is always better to have the excess than to) Two running from battery (notice the length difference on the negative cable due to it's role with the switch). One from switch to the negative junction. Two from the negative junction to the corresponding LEDs. Two from the positive junction to the corresponding LEDs. NOTE: Remember to remove the isolation from the tips of your cables and secure your connections with the hot glue once you are sure that no more changes are needed. Now onto the first electrical part, the battery. For our purposes we will be using only two of the three pins of the battery holder. Since we will be using a CR2032 PCB battery holder, we will need to run cables from it as you can see above. IMPORTANT: Please make notice that the POSITIVE side of the CR2032 is going to be facing UP, which is marked by the positive sign (+) on the battery holder. Paste the battery holder to the frame as indicated in DIAGRAM N°1 and follow the cabling routes. We will run the negative cable directly to the push switch, connecting it to the middle pin which would be pin N°2 as per DIAGRAM N°2 (bellow) which is a top side view. Securing the cables can be quite tricky at first, so have patience and continue until both the output and input cables are secured on their respective pins. For more information on this type of switch, this Hackster.io guide is highly recommended. The positive cable will stay disconnected for now, just solder it to the battery holder and secure it to avoid any possible damage. After you have tested the connectivity and the switch's functionality with one of the LEDs by using your phone's camera to see if it lights up, secure the switch to the frame with the hot glue gun. Make sure that they have no play/slack and are stable. Now we move on to the major part, which is the connection of the battery with the rest of the cables and the front LED. This part will require that you remove the isolation from the ends of the cables, both for the upper and lower frame legs. Follow this diagram to see how the connection is done. Note that the front LED lacks any cable connections and is soldered directly into the joint. Trim the LED legs accordingly and please make sure that the polarity of the LED is being soldered into the correct joint. The longer leg on the LED typically is the positive anode. We are almost done, now all that's left is soldering the other two LEDs. This step should be pretty simple since you have already made more difficult joints. Now that you are done, make sure that everything is working by checking the LED's functionality with your phone's camera as we did previously. Once that's cleared out, secure the cables and the LEDs to the frame with hot glue to avoid corrosion and any kind of damage. At the end, you should have something like this: STEP 4: MODIFY THE PS3 CAMERA For this step you will need the PS3 Camera and the diskette/negative film that I mentioned back in step two. There are TWO types of PS3 Eye cameras, one of which will be useless for this project. Thankfully, these two are very distinctive from one another when it comes to the lens. You DON'T want the one that has the flat lens. This one cannot be modified and would be a waste of time to even open it. Here is a reference so you can see the flat lens: Please note the flat lens cover and the ring. These are telltale sings of this model of camera. The one we want has the rounded lens, which is very evident once you see it: This is the one we want as it has a modifiable lens, specifically, it has an easily removable IR filter. This will allow our camera to become very IR sensitive. Since I modified mine off camera a long time ago, I cannot provide you with my own photos as examples. Instead, I will guide you to the video I followed when modifying mine. It was made by Vazina Robertson: STEP 5: SOFTWARE To get your computer to recognize the PS3 Camera, you will have to download drivers for it. The only one that's completely guaranteed to work is CL-Eye so look for that one. Make sure that it is working properly. For our tracking we will be using OpenTrack, which is an opensource head-tracking software that's very reliable and relatively easy to set up. When you first boot it up you will be greeted by this window: Although it might look a little crude and daunting at first, this software is very intuitive once you are done with the initial setup. Before you do anything else, please click on the hammer that's next to PointTracker 1.1 Make sure that your device is set to the PS3 Camera and that all the other parameters are good to go. Once you are done with that click on the Model tab. Click on the correspondent tab and adjust the measurements to your specific profile, be it a clip or a cap. Calibrate your model position too, that will help the software to make more precise calculations. We are now done with the model side of things! Now we need to set up our curvatures and game detection. To make OpenTrack function with most games, you will have to go to the Game Detection tab under Options: Click the + icon and add the executable name and a profile. It is that simple! To set up the curvatures we will need to click the Mapping function on the main menu which will open this window: These values are completely up to your discretion and will be completely dependent on your setup, distance to the camera and head position. This will take some effort and time to get right but you should be able to tweak this values down to your liking. STEP 6: ENJOY! I hope that this guide helped you build this game changing tool and I wish that you will enjoy it as much as I do. Please contact me if there are any mistakes on this guide or parts in which I could expand upon. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

After a very long time in development, Team Fusion Simulations has finally released a new expansion for IL-2 Cliffs of Dover-BLITZ on August 6th, 2020. This comes in the form of IL-2 Desert Wings-TOBRUK, a very huge expansion that will mainly take you to the skies of Africa to participate on historical battles for, or against the Afrika Korps. As usual, with my reviews I will separate this into several categories so that you, the reader, can formulate your own judgement as to whether this expansion is for you: Introduction Scenery and Aircraft variety External and internal 3D models Visual and sound effects Flight and damage modelling Single player content Bugs, issues and the promising future Is this expansion for you? DISCLAIMER: I was given a review copy of this expansion by Team Fusion Simulations themselves, which was very kind of them. Even then, they gave us complete creative freedom over this review and the opinions that will be written are my own. INTRODUCTION If any game deserves to have its development story told, it's this one. It is a story of a game that was launched in a sorry state to later be fixed by a dedicated community of modders, who eventually became the sole keepers of its code and kept the project alive. The official developers moved on, allocating their full resources to their newest game, IL-2 Great Battles. Launching in a broken state in 2011, Cliffs of Dover was naturally met with mediocre reviews. The sim was absolutely riddled with bugs, many of which made the experience quite the hassle for customers. That's where Team Fusion comes into the scene. As a group of modders, they dedicated themselves to keeping CLoD alive while also maintaining a community of fans of the game entertained with fixes and patches. This all changed when 1C Game Studios announced that Team Fusion, now known as Team Fusion Simulations, would take over development of CLoD while 1C focused themselves on the development and maintenance of the IL-2 Great Battles series. This left two active series on the IL-2 franchise: IL-2 CLoD and IL-2 Great Battles, both are independent from each other and add-ons are not compatible between them as they both use different engines, CLoD's being the older one of the two. Please keep this in mind as it will be important later on. It is truly inspiring to see how a group of passionate individuals, against all expectations, became something much larger and I congratulate them for it. They now have managed to release Desert Wings after its development started in late 2016 with an initial release date of 2017 that got delayed little by little until it finally released a couple of weeks ago to very good reception. SCENERY AND AIRCRAFT VARIETY Set in the desert of North Africa, this expansion brings to life a somewhat overlooked side of WW2. From Tomahawks and Messerschmitts duking it out in the skies over Egypt to Heinkels intercepting allied convoys on the Mediterranean Sea, it truly lets you experience this side of the war in an unprecedented way. The map is pretty decently sized with 385 kilometers square of play area for you to fly over, which is divided somewhat 60/40 between ground and sea with most of the ground areas being filled with endless desert. Coastal regions are pretty attractive with cliffs and beaches and the few cities that there are have enough detail to make them pop when you see them. Although, that being said, do not expect this to have the graphical quality of its younger brother: IL-2 Great Battles. The color pallet seems to be a bit weird which makes the sand sometimes look a bit too bright but that is not the norm. It is noticeable that the devs are pushing this game engine to its limits, at least when it comes to graphical fidelity. But if there is one thing that this expansion does better than its successor is that it provides an impressive amount of aircraft to fly with several new flyable aircraft and a lot of new variants to the already available aircraft from CLoD. There are three of these that caught my attention: DEWOITINE D.520 This little bird won my heart the moment I set my eyes on her. From the way that it looks to the way she flies, this has got to be one of the most impressive ones included in Desert Wings. It is available in both standard configuration, and its tropical variant. While it does not boast the heaviest firepower around, it can still defend itself quite well while fighting early BF-109 variants. Additionally, just like the aircraft that I will highlight next, this is the only modern game to include this beautiful machine in a flyable state. GRUMMAN MARTLET MK.III Powerful, chunky and with a lot of charm. That's the best way to describe this version of the Wildcat under RAF colors. While it isn't the best dogfighter in the allied roster, it does have very good survivability when compared to some of the Nazi aircraft. Also, as far as I am aware of, this is the only modern simulator to include this bird in a flyable form which could not make me happier. VICKERS WELLINGTON If you want to go big, you have this. Amazing to fly and easy to operate, this heavy bomber will either be a pleasure to use or a pleasure to die on. Available in both conventional and torpedo capable versions, it brings a completely different type of aircraft to the game. There are a lot more aircraft than these three, including a couple that I wasn't expecting such as the Fiat CR.42 and the Gladiator, overlooked biplanes that served for the Italians and British respectively during this conflict. Recon/training aircraft, dedicated fighters, fighter bombers, medium and heavy bombers, this expansion has them all; making it of the most attractive parts of the product. I am sure you too will have a very enjoyable time flying them over both the deserts of Africa and the skies of Britain and France. EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS Out of all the areas that I have evaluated for this review, I was the most impressed by this one. The developers have one quite a good job with the modeling and texturing of their assets, mainly with aircraft. Some of these do look a bit too glossy some times, but that is something that is not as bad as it sounds. External models are brimming with details, rivets and panels are discernible when the sun hits them, glass looks like glass although it might be a bit too reflective. Markings are modular giving you the chance to represent a large amount of squadrons regardless of allegiance and time period. In the customization menu you are able to do something that no other game can do, this being the capability to add or reduce texture weathering effects which has been a feature since CLoD released. In my honest opinion, the cockpits are significantly higher quality than the external models. They have very high quality textures, detailed models and semi-clickable functionality. Are they study-level? No, but that was never the point to begin with. They look realistic enough to immerse you into the game and that's what matters. Here are some of my favorites, but keep in mind that these screenshots do not do these cockpits justice as too much detail is lost on the larger zoom settings as it is natural: The way the light shines on the gauges and the way it is reflected from the different types of materials inside of the cockpit is truly wonderful, even more when you consider that this expansion is built on a 2011 game engine. I applaud the developers for their work on this department. VISUAL AND SOUND EFFECTS This area is a bit of a hit and miss. While the visual effects can be pretty good at times, even when considering the age of the game engine, the sound effects can be a little off. Don't get me wrong, it is not that the sounds are terrible, it is that there are times which sounds were the factor that took me out of the immersion of flying in this simulator. Engine sounds are better inside of the cockpit, mainly regarding the engine. The aircraft's engine will still communicate critical information to you constantly with its sound and it does it quite well. This is more notorious when you have already received damage either through combat or incorrect operation of the engine. Metal cracking sounds from high stress scenarios will communicate to you the limits of the airframe you are on. Gun sounds and external sounds are the part that suffers from most problems but it is also the one with more exceptions. While some external engine sounds are wonderful, such as when they are taking off, some of them are not. The one I would consider to be the most problematic would be the "fly-by" sound as it sounds like a time accelerated engine sound instead of a dynamic one. I sincerely hope that this could be addressed on a future patch as it would improve the experience significantly. Visual effects are of better quality than I was expecting, but one has to remember this is an expansion to a relatively old game. Even when taking that into consideration, I was pleasantly surprised by some of the things I saw. From oil leaks on the canopy once the engine had received some damage or the flames coming out of a downed bomber with pieces of fuselage coming out as it tumbled down into the coldness of the Mediterranean Sea. I do have one small gripe with the flight control surface animations. If you move them slowly there's no problem but if you move them rapidly they seem to act in a weird way, skipping some positions and moving in a janky manner. I had noticed this way back when I bought CLoD BLITZ but I hoped that this release would have addressed it. It is not a game-breaking issue but I do hope that it is addressed in the future if possible. FLIGHT AND DAMAGE MODELING More important than both sound and visual effects, this is the category that both makes and breaks a game. It can be difficult to get a flight model to feel right as there are so many factors that can interact with it. Fortunately, flight models of both CLoD and Desert Wings received some attention and has been noticeably improved! Torque effects seem to be more natural and trimming now feels smoother. Pulling tight turns is now a pleasure on fighter aircraft, making you feel completely in control with your aircraft. This is also noticeable on the less maneuverable aircraft like the Wellington or the He-111, which feel heavier and at the same time more powerful. They take time to react to your inputs, which is natural for a larger, heavier aircraft. Damage modeling is also pretty extensive with simulations of oil, water and fuel leaks, overheating, asymmetrical lift due to wing damage, etc. You can lose parts of your engine or even your entire engine or wing if you are that unlucky/unaware. I was honestly impressed by the flight models, they are fun to fly. I am glad that Team Fusion improved them over what they were on CLoD, and they were not bad there. SINGLE PLAYER CONTENT This expansion oozes with content of all shapes and forms. From quick missions, pre-arranged dogfighting scenarios, short missions and expansive campaigns across both Africa and the Channel. The highlight of this gigantic content pool comes in the form of the previously mentioned campaigns, which are, in no particular order: Gravity is my friend (Ju-87 Desert Campaign) Blue Wellingtons (Wellington Daylight Desert Bombing Campaign) Rising from the Ashes (Beaufighter Interceptor Channel Campaign) Desert Hawks (Tomahawk Desert Campaign) Eagles over Tobruk (BF-109 Desert Campaign) On ne passe pas! (Dewoitine Channel Campaign) Operta Aperta (Gladiator Desert Campaign) Tempesta sull'Africa (CR.42 Desert Campaign) Rats over Tobruk (Hurricane Desert Campaign) Nine different campaigns that cover several different aircraft and timeframes. That's quite a lot considering that some of these campaigns were made with realism in mind, following routines and combat mission records from the war to allow the player to experience something akin to what the real pilots went through. I, for one, quite enjoyed the addition of these campaigns as they allowed me to immerse myself in some of these combat missions. But realism comes at a cost and that is time. Some of these missions can be quite lengthy at times and, as it was routine back then and now, you will have little to do on the way to the area of operations. Whether that is a good or a bad thing is up to each person, but I personally don't dislike it. Time acceleration can help with these long stretches, minimizing the downtime and making more efficient use of your time. Additionally, you do have access to a full mission editor that allows you to create the missions that suit your taste. Do you want to fight a cloud of He-111 with a Gladiator while escorting a British armada? It is possible with the mission editor. It is a powerful but somewhat unintuitive tool so it is recommended that you read or watch some tutorials on how to properly utilize it. BUGS, ISSUES AND THE PROMISING FUTURE I have spent 20 hours in-game since I received the expansion and in that time I have encountered some bugs, but surprisingly, none of them were major or game-breaking. I have mentioned some of them throughout the review but there is one still that is noteworthy: Under certain scenarios, like engine damage, the propeller effect can be seen duplicated/out of sync which makes it seem like there are two counter-rotating propellers. This is not that bad but it does happen from time to time. The only other issue that I have with the game is not related to the expansion but to the game itself, and that's the UI. There are multiple issues with the UI that could be improved with a bit of design work and coding, but since I am not a coder I can't tell how easy it would be to reprogram this. The part where this is more apparent is the Quick Mission Builder, as here the amount of icons and text on screen can be a little confusing to the eye. It becomes usable once you start to work with it but that does not make it less cluttered or unintuitive. This is the biggest flaw that this game has had since it launched way back in 2011 but I hope that Team Fusion will allocate some effort into redesigning it. What brings me a bit of hope is the fact that Team Fusion has stated that they are now dedicated to continue bug fixing and to start feature development for the game. These improvements include but are not limited to VR support, new weather system, a dynamic campaign generator and improved ground rendering. All of these improvements will be released for both owners of CLoD and Desert Wings in the form of incremental updates free to all users. More information on this on their forum announcement. IS THIS EXPANSION FOR YOU? At a price of USD$69.99 this expansion can be a hard buy for many people. It is on the same price bracket as the expansions for its younger brother, IL-2 Great Battles. But comparing one to the other wouldn't be fair as they run on different engines and are developed by different development teams. But with the amount of content that it provides it is hard not to somewhat justify the pricing a bit as it includes nine different campaigns and single missions, over 40 aircraft including 8 rare warbirds all which sport very detailed and well made 3D models, an expansive map, new ground and sea assets with the possibility of controlling them in the future with an upcoming update. If what you want is: An immersive desert warfare experience. the possibility to fly some very rare warbirds. Experience an overlooked side of WW2. If you don't mind: Some of the bugs The current UI design. The somewhat dated sound design. The somewhat high price If some of all of the above is what you want, then IL-2 Desert Wings-TOBRUK is for you. Once again, we would like to thank Team Fusion Simulations for providing us a review copy of their expansion when we got in contact with them, so thanks to both Mike and Pete for trusting us. It is a gesture we appreciate a lot. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034 Thanks to Aidan, Prov and Hueman for their proofreading of this article.

For years now, the Royal International Air Tatoo (RIAT) has been one of if not the largest airshow in the world. It has brought together aviation fans from all over the world to partake in a celebration of aviation and military aviation. Sadly, due to this year's situation, the physical event had to be cancelled, but that did not mean that there was not a RIAT in 2020. This year RIAT moved to the virtual space, livestreaming a two day show free for everyone to see. Instead of the numerous real life demonstration teams that usually attend, this was the first time that virtual demonstration teams took the main stage and showed the world that the virtual side of aviation also has something to present. There were seven acrobatic display teams of various sizes that participated. Virtual Patrouille Suisse, Virtual Patrouille Française, Virtual Swiss Hornet Solo Display, Virtual Belgian F-16 Solo, Virtual Rafale Solo Display by Jetesons, Virtual Red Arrows and our friends, the Frecce Tricolori Virtuali (FTV). Today in this short interview we had the chance to talk with the FTV about their time during Virtual RIAT 2020 and the experience they had during the event: Q: Getting invited to RIAT is not something that happens that often. How did you guys feel when first getting invited to perform there? A: Excited ! We actually could not believe [that during such difficult times] the world was [going] through, it turned out [to be] an incredible opportunity for us in the virtual world. It then took a couple of days to cool down and let us realize the correct methodology in order to correctly [structure] our training sessions. Q: To your knowledge, before RIAT 2020, has there ever been a real world airshow organization that has worked with virtual demonstration teams to create a program? A: Not on a macroscopic scale such as the Virtual RIAT in 2020. Many airshow organizers are considering involving a virtual counterpart not being the star of the show (unfortunately or luckily …it depends) but to let the everyday people have at least 1/100th of the feelings of what they are showcasing in the air. Q: Because RIAT was such a unique opportunity for FTV and virtual demonstration teams as a whole, was preparing for RIAT more stressful or complicated than your past shows? A: It was the natural step [forward] for us. No one [improves] by being stagnant and not stressed, at least a little bit more than before. So it was for us the mental preparation the 2 months before the show. Q: How long was the team given to prepare for the event? A: Not everything was ready [at the time that] the official communication that we would take part on the show [happened] (and that is normal business), so to some degree this question has [several] answers. In fact, our routine was slightly changed starting from 2 months before to accommodate for the different ways we would start and finish the show. The team continued to train and as the show approached, a few but significant additional features (the scenario, the length of the show, etc) were added and so our training sessions increased to accommodate those additional modifications. Q: Did RIAT ever give the team a time limit for the routine? Did you guys have to adapt your usual routine to fit this time slot by leaving some maneuvers away? A: We were given a certain amount of minutes that were aligned with our show and we did not cut away any maneuvers. Q: What maneuvers does the team feel were the highlight of the routine this time around? A: The correct positioning and harmony of flight of the two sections while in front of the crowds are always the most difficult and the most proudly accepted among our team and the viewers. Q: There were other virtual acrobatic teams participating during RIAT, like the Virtual Red Arrows. Did you guys watch their routines? What do you think about how they performed? A: The Virtual Reds have always expressed a high level of technical maturity and preparation. They displayed very well during the RIAT 2020. Those performances should constitute the “raised bar” every major team should want to reach. Q: You guys closed Day 2 of RIAT but your time slot seemed quite short and was not included in the official public schedule for that day. Was the team aware of this prior to the live show? A: Unfortunately, no one could [have been] aware of the technical difficulties that could arise. Q: How does the team feel in regards to the technical difficulty that cut several minutes from the routines you had recorded? How long was the routine originally? A: FTV were not very happy in the beginning, but the organizations explained the reasons, so] that we completely understood. The standard FTV display is about 23-25 minutes, shortened to 15 minutes by rules. Q: Do you feel like the RIAT organizers should have done something different? What would be your recommendations for them so that they can improve? A: It [was] a first and so it worked out pretty well I should say. There is always room to improve and the [organizers] should take [note] of what [is] necessary to introduce close to the show and [to try] to let everyone know more in advance. To conclude I would like to thank Duke, as he is our main contact point with the FTV as a whole. Grazie mille, amico mio! Their entire Virtual RIAT 2020 display is available to watch here, so be sure to give it a watch if you have not already: About the interviewer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

During the Autumn Steam Game Festival 2020, a couple of flight games released public demos for everyone to try. One of these was Red Wings: Aces of the Sky; an arcade flight game set in during World War I. Initially released for the Nintendo Switch earlier this year to mixed reviews, this game is now getting a release on Steam so I gave the demo a go. I will divide these short first impressions in categories so you can go to the ones that are more crucial to you as a reader, that way you can judge it on your own: Graphics and Art-style Gameplay and Aircraft Variety Mission Design PC Port Oddities GRAPHICS AND ART STYLE Instead of going for photo-realism, this game has a cel-shaded cartoon-ish art style which is very unique for a flight game. The menus and interfaces all look really sleek and well designed. This style also applies to the environments which most of the time do look like paintings done in oil. The opening cinematic has more of a comic-ish art style which is really well done for what it is supposed to accomplish. The UI and HUD elements also have this cartoon look to them, making each element pop when it is on screen. The animations of the UI elements are also very well done, no critiques to give there. Overall, this has got to be the strongest appeal of this title Here are a couple of screenshots of both the main menu, the in-game HUD and a frame of the opening cinematic: GAMEPLAY AND AIRCRAFT VARIETY Gameplay-wise it is a pretty straight-forward game as it is to be expected from an arcade flight game. Simple flight dynamics alongside simplified bullet mechanics make this game one that is pretty easy to play and even easier to master. You do not have to lead your targets as there does not seem to be any kind of bullet travel time, making distant shots more of a matter of effective weapon range rather than skill. The flight mechanics are even a bit too limited to the point where they feel restrictive. You lack full control of both the X and Y axis, and the Z axis is basically none existent. While this is partially solved by the use of your abilities, specifically the barrel roll and the U turn, the fact that these abilities have a cool-down makes them a bit harder to use in a pinch. One of these abilities recharges as you get kills, let's call this one a "take-down". It allows you to finish off an already badly damaged opponent with your handgun. While flashy-looking, this feature feels unnecessary as you already have the enemy in your sights when you use it. Very anime-esk, which I really like. To summarize: the best way I have to describe the feel of flight in the game is an even more limited "Novice" mode from Ace Combat. At least in that flight mode you get full pitch authority, unlike here. And it is not something that can just be just patched in as the game seems to have been built around this flight model due to the fact that you can used "canned" maneuvers just like in games such as Sky Crawlers: Innocent Aces or Ace Combat: 3D Cross Rumble. I suspect this was a decision taken to make this game as accessible as possible. This game does have pilot skills which you can upgrade called "Ace Perks" which improve the issues mentioned previously. These go from minor upgrades to your abilities to major improvements but sadly, the latter were not possible to unlock in the demo. You upgrade these abilities with the stars you gain after completing a mission, gaining one upgrade point minimum and three maximum. It is uncertain as how impactful some of these upgrades will be in the long run due to the limitations that the demo has as you can only obtain a maximum of 12 stars in the demo during its 4 available missions. The demo allows you to fly three aircraft, all of which are real and relatively famous designs from the Triple Alliance's air corps/air forces during WW1. These are the following: The only aircraft that feels different is the Fokker, with it being a bit more maneuverable that the other two. Both the Albatros and the Taube feel almost the same, both having a bit more speed than the Fokker. There are five aircraft in total for the Austro-Hungarian side, but the other two are unavailable to fly on the demo version. MISSION DESIGN This is the part which gives me the most worries. The demo shows you two types of missions: Dogfight oriented missions (with three variations) and a race-like mission. The dogfight missions can have different focuses such as obtaining the maximum score to time trials in which you have to shoot every plane down in the shortest time possible. Missions are really short, with them only having a short "story" paragraph to justify the combat scenario. Story does not seem to be the focus of this game, rather, it seems to be an excuse to put the player in different scenarios. This works perfectly for a demo but, in a full game which promises to be 50 missions long, I sincerely fear that mission design will become rather repetitive. Remember, these are my first impressions, the full game might prove me wrong here but all I can say is that I hope that I am wrong about the feeling I got from the demo missions. PC PORT ODDITIES I will keep this section short and sweet. There are no performance issues what so ever, the game runs smooth as butter even in my three year old computer; but that does not mean that there are no problems with the game when it comes to the port. The graphical options are pretty limited, with only three presets available to set the graphical parameters (LOW, MEDIUM and HIGH). It lacks any kind of graphical customization aside from brightness and the other typical options such as window mode. The main issue I have with the port is that it is still designed around a controller, therefore, there is no mouse cursor to be found. Not even in the menus, there is no way of using the mouse in this game. This frustrated me a bit and I really hope that the devs add it, even if it only pops up to use the menus. CLOSING THOUGHTS Overall, this was a very solid demo that showed the good and the bad that the game has to offer. It gives you just enough to judge if the game is for your or not. If what you read sounds like this is something you could like, give the demo a go, although it might not be available as of the time of publication. Here is a link to the Steam page for the game so you can check it out for yourself. This is not an affiliate link, therefore, we stand to gain nothing from you clicking it. But we encourage you to at least give this game a go if you enjoy arcade flight games at all. About the author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

War Thunder is a game well known for a lot of reasons. From its impressively extensive line-up of vehicles to the drama that happens from time to time in the community from unbalanced tiers or broken features that eventually get patched out, until the next patch where the cycle repeats. But inside of the War Thunder community there is a smaller group that strives to use the game in other ways, to modify it and use its engine for their own community creations. The modders of War Thunder always try to push the boundaries of what is possible in this free-to-play game by creating everything from their own custom missions to more complex mods like custom aircraft and vehicles and sharing them for everyone to enjoy. To date, the most complex mod of them all is Ace Thunder Zero. This mod is, in my opinion, the single most amazing piece of content that the War Thunder community has ever put out. Today we talk with its main developer and the person behind the vision that made this project possible, Avarik, to get a little more perspective as to how complex this mod really is and what it took to make it a reality. Q: What made you get into modding War Thunder or just modding in general? Did you have any help or someone that helped you learn the ropes? A: I've got into modding in War Thunder from my desire to create cinematics. I first started to learn the ropes of the Mission Editor back when Gaijin Entertainment opened up user missions to online custom battles, I joined the group of mission creators who were the first beta testers of that functionality, from then I played around a lot with the mission editor and learnt to utilize actions and conditions more efficiently, and I have lightly touched at modifying existing units in War Thunder for some of my earlier cinematics. But my first true experience with modding the game was when I was making Battle Thunder 1944, a recreation of Battlefield 1942's intro cinematic, it was my first attempt at exporting a model to War Thunder and my first true experience at modding the game, where I modified and created custom units so that I could create most of the scenes using both myself and the AI to make them as accurate as possible. It took me about 3 or so months to finish, but I learnt valuable information from it and from there I continued to develop my experience and knowledge of the War Thunder CDK and the Dagor engine in general. I did have help to learn the ropes from another guy who I was working on the mod with, RideR2, but also other fellow people in the CDK community, Gallonmate in particular who taught me how to export 3d models into War Thunder, and when I couldn't find some answers I turned to datamining and reverse engineering existing configurations, which helped me develop my own methods for more serious modding. Gaijin Entertainment themselves have also been fundamentally involved in helping me learn how to us their tools, when I didn't know how to do something that wasn't available on their wiki or I failed to datamine myself, I turned to them directly, their developers are amazing people who love to share their knowledge, I wouldn't have known half of what I know if not for them. Q: This has got to be the most complex mod out there for War Thunder as of now, congratulations on finally getting out there. But I have got to ask, with so many features, for how long were you working on this mod? Did you ever think about giving up at some time? A: It took me approximately 1.5 years on and off to create this mod, I work in the gaming industry myself and my job takes a considerable amount of my time so I spent most of my free time developing Ace Thunder Zero, it was a long ride but I feel it was worth the effort. I didn't really think about giving up, but my original pitch was actually to just continue to create cinematics, but when I saw the overwhelming amount of people who wanted to play with the exported models I figured I might as well try to make an actual proper mod for War Thunder with a higher production value than most mods, RideR2 joined me in this endeavour after showing interest in creating an arcade-like game mode for War Thunder, and Ace Combat was clearly the best choice for this game mode. It isn't a secret that I've invested both time and money into this, I didn't want to just create a visual mod or a simple one, I wanted to create a mod with a story-line and completely new game mechanics, that is what kept me forward from giving up. Q: Where there any features that were particularly hard to implement or ones in which you had to take a creative approach in order to make it work? A: The one thing that ended up being hard to make it work properly were the SAM, TLS and MPBM. Originally, ground and naval units in War Thunder could not fire rockets or missiles properly without some workarounds, and this is to an extent true to aircraft as well. Me and RideR2 discovered that, if we bind the weapon group of the missile to that of a standard weapon, and make the AI also fire a dummy gun, it will make them fire a missile too, that is how we were able to get SAM units to work. The TLS was mostly an easy implementation, but as more patches came out for War Thunder, the more broken it became, at some point the laser stopped doing damage and we were forced to add another invisible weapon to compensate for that, which worked out well in the end as we were able to more easily balance the damage the TLS did. It also currently only renders in cockpit view, yet it still functions normally in any other view and will damage enemies correctly. The MPBM was mostly an easy implementation, but we ran into some issues with the blast radius until we figured out we can override the game's normal parameters by removing the explosive type the weapon would use, making it purely dependent on blast radius and explosive mass. Q: As far as I understand there were other people involved in the making of this mod. Who are they and what did they do? A: Originally it was just me and RideR2, me being the 3D model/animation guy expert who created custom assets and also the one who used the CDK for asset utilization and the main mission creator, while RideR2 was the guy who did most of the configuration and template creations and made all units and weaponry behave the way they did, he also created The Gauntlet mission. I've also received major help from RythusOmega and Dantofu when it comes to handling models from Ace Combat 7, if not for them I wouldn't have started doing Ace Combat cinematics and later on the Ace Thunder mod. Besides me and RideR2, there were a lot of other people who contributed the following: Net-Zone: Broken Accord's OST GaMetal: The Gauntlet's OST Pandramodo: Trailer creation njmksr: ADFX-02 skins leroyonly: Dracul, MiG-21 & Potato skins reyhael: Normal mapping mobiusu14: Briefing Screen mothman47: Briefing Narrator Flipped StuG: AWWNB Pilot 1 Essi: Escudo 2 Ronan Yakowitz: AWACS Sick2Day: Savage 1 & AI skins The Iron Armenian aka G.I. Haigs: Savage 2 Michiganon: Osean Army Platoon Optical Ilyushin: Halo 1 Yimie Yu: Halo 4 and Grau Team emblem artwork Lt Rainbow Slash: Dracul 1 - Ac3ofNight: Grau 3 Flaschengeist: Grau 2 Dane Ewell / SwissChicken: Grau 1 Eclipse: Grau 4 Atsuk0: Tester lnVader: Tester Killerofal: Tester Vulpinaut: Tester MikeGoesBoom: Tester Roach: Tester Q: I was genuinely surprised to see the opening cutscene having as much detail as it did. It felt like a genuine homage to Ace Combat Zero’s style with a lot of attention to detail. For how long was this in the works and how hard was this to make? A: In short: Very hard. Before coming up with the idea of making a briefing cinematic for the mod, I wanted to make sure I get all the details correctly and not just make a simple briefing that shows what the player needs to do, there have been a lot of lore to cover to make sure no holes are made or mis-match with existing Ace Combat Zero canon, I wanted to stick to the original story but from a different point of view. I've commissioned Mobiusu14 to create a briefing cutscene after I have seen his previous artwork of an Ace Combat 7 briefing styled in Ace Combat Zero. Mobiusu14 created all the 2d assets and 3d animation, while I animated and organized all the 2d assets and script for the narrator, Mothman47, who did a spectacular job being the briefing guy. Mobiusu14 is also an excellent artist and I hope we all get to work together again if more missions are made.The briefing itself took us about 3 or so months to finish, implementing it in the game wasn't as hard but certainly not easy either. The cinematics rely on a feature that exists in War Thunder but has not been made open for custom assets and has only been utilized in tutorial missions, until Gaijin opened it up for us - It's basically a configuration file that tells the game to render video and image files located in the game's folders. Q: How are the “Destroyed” and the rest of UI elements handled? Are they static images over imposed over the screen? A: Correct, they are static images I created myself based on their Ace Combat Zero counterpart, they too use that configuration file I mentioned which renders external images and videos in the game. Q: Story-wise the mod does fit very well with what we know happened in ACZ, taking some liberties of course. Did you have any help with the writing of the dialogue and the setting? Ace Thunder Zero trailer by Pandramodo. A: For the most part the dialogue and settings was mostly my own research and knowledge of Ace Combat lore, but since I was working with other people who have played and know a lot about Ace Combat lore, they too have helped with that, especially Mobiusu14 while we were working on the briefing. I have thought a lot ahead for when and if I create more missions, so I have the full storyline already in check and ready to be utilized for future missions implementation, all fitting within existing canon, I have no intention to change the storyline or the outcome of the original Ace Combat Zero ending, but I'm not gonna spoil how I plan to wrap things up. Since I believe most people recognize the "Mercenary route" as the canon route in Ace Combat Zero, I am trying to follow A World With No Boundaries story and point of view with that in mind, and the lore actually goes much deeper with that - Try to decipher who each member of Grau Team is for example and then look how deep the rabbit holes goes. :) Q: The enemy AI is very aggressive and maneuvers really well, for War Thunder that is. Did you make any tweaks to it? A: Of course, the AI uses modified flight models and damage models, but other than that it uses standard AI behavior from existing configurations located in the game, we currently have no way to create true custom AI properties but perhaps this will be doable in the future, we do know how to customize them but the game has no way of reading custom properties at this time. The standard AI is also not able to fire missiles normally, like with the ground units. RideR2 and me have discovered that AI aircraft can in fact fire rockets and missiles if they are fired from a turret, so the solution was to add static invisible turrets to them and this way they can fire missiles at enemy aircraft. Q: It was a bit odd seeing heat seeker missiles track ground targets as I know that is not a possibility inside vanilla WT. How is this handled in-game? A: It wasn't a possibility back then which forced us to use a workaround - I created an invisible box model and designated it as an aircraft. By planting that aircraft under ground units, I was able to make heat seeking missiles track and attack them, but nowadays this is a simple toggle feature in the missile's configuration file, you can simply tell the missile what kind of unit it can track, so if you want to make a heat seeker that can track both air and ground targets, you can very easily do just that by changing a line of code. Q: Last but certainly not least, do you have any future plans in regards with War Thunder modding? A: Hopefully, yes. Besides advancing the Ace Thunder mod further, I do wish to share my knowledge and help expand the modding community in War Thunder so that more people will give it a try and perhaps come up with things even greater than what I have done - War Thunder is a game with limitless modding potential, but the knowledge and desire to actually mod the game is very scarce in the community, I hope that can be changed for the better. I would like to extend my thanks to Avarik for allowing me to have this interview with him, it was a pleasure to talk to him. Please, if you have not already, do yourself a favor and try Ace Thunder Zero. I assure you that you will have a blast playing with the Morgan against hordes of aircraft and even aces! About the interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy#9034

First hitting the skies of DCS in 2017, the AJS-37 Viggen has established itself as a standard of quality in the game. It was released under Leatherneck Simulations at first but after some internal struggles arose, the entire development team behind the Viggen parted ways with Leatherneck and Magnitude 3, becoming the studio now known as Heatblur Simulations. A ground-pounder by soul, this double delta provides a suite of possibilities like no other module out there. Unique weaponry and a very believable ground radar functionality, this aircraft makes itself shine through raw uniqueness alone. In this review I will dive deep into the Viggen and all its quirks and features to let you, the reader, judge if this Swedish monster is for you. This piece will be divided into several parts: External and internal 3D models Visual and sound effects Flight modelling Mission capability Armament Ease of use and learning curve Single player content Is this aircraft for you? EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS If there is one thing that defines Heatblur it is quality and the Viggen shows it. This aircraft has been modeled to an extreme amount of detail. Nothing comes out as wonky or out of date, which is impressive considering that this module is now over three years old. A lot of love was put into making it a realistic depiction of the AJS-37, down to some things I wouldn't have thought important or crucial. EVEN THE SMALL THINGS The thing that impressed me the most is that this is one of if not the only aircraft with a modeled RAT turbine. This is something that most players will not even notice or care about as it is not a weapon or a system you will rely upon constantly, but it shows the degree of which this module has been modeled. If there is another set of features that I particularly liked, they are all the animations, particularly the thrust-reverser. A unique feature to the Viggen as of the time of writing. While I will not go in-depth in this section of the review on how awesome the reverser is. I will show you its cool animation just because I do not want to think I am the only one that likes things like this. Cockpit-wise, the Viggen continues to impress me with its quality. From the lighting to the texture work, this is one of the only cockpits that I turn in just to look at it. The way the lights react with the weathered textures and the glow of the radar scope give it a very in-era look, which I always welcome. The only "bad" part is that some of the textures are starting to age a bit, particularly on the text, but that is something that Heatblur can improve upon. Here are some day and night shots of it so you can see for yourself: VISUAL AND SOUND EFFECTS This is an area in which a lot of aircraft do good at and the Viggen is no different. While it does not have any fancy over wing vapor effects, wingtip vortexes can be seen on both the main wing and, in cases of high AoA, on the canards as well. In terms of other external effects that are noteworthy the only one that I can think of my mind is the afterburner effect: The effect is different from other aircraft as the "flame" does not extend too far away from the fuselage, but as far as I know that is by design and correct to the Volvo RM8A engine. The area where the Viggen shines the most is its sound. It is clear that the developers wanted this part of the module to be much more polished than the rest of the modules out there. From the distinct clanks of the switches to the clicks that the throttle makes as it moves over its detents, this gives life to the aircraft. Afterburners are no joke either, being clearly audible from inside and outside the cockpit, letting you know how your engine is behaving. There is one particular sound in this aircraft that you do not want to hear, but I will go over that in the next section of the review. Overall, the Viggen has one of the best designed sound environments in DCS and I am glad that Heatblur put a lot of effort into it. Here are some clips so you can hear what I just described to you, pay attention to the clicks of the throttle as I move it: EXAMPLES In-cockpit on the ground (idle-full afterburner-idle) In-cockpit in the air (idle-full afterburner-idle) External sound on the ground (idle-full afterburner-idle) Fly-by at 900Km/h (Volume warning) FLIGHT MODELING Ohboy, here is the best part of the module. This bird feels authentic not just because it is a joy to fly, but because it can also be a pain to fly. Let me explain myself. The brilliantly crazy people that made this module made sure that even the bad parts of the Viggen's characteristics were there, including the dreaded compressor stalls that one can suffer at high AoA. That is the only sound you do not want to hear in this aircraft; I will leave a sample at the end of this section. The Viggen likes being down-low, it was designed for it. It has outstanding acceleration on the deck and can out-accelerate most other aircraft but only at low altitude, so keep that in mind for those intercept missions out there. Maneuverability-wise this is not an aircraft you will want to do dogfights in. Even though it has an excellent instant turn-rate, that will stop the moment you run out of energy. Your engine starts starving, craving for air that it is not getting, so be careful with those. It is a relatively stable platform with the help of SPOK, your stability augmentation system. With it enabled, you will notice less oscillations as you get out of a bank or similar situations. It can also help you to land thanks to the AFK, your automatic throttle control. This system will maintain 550kph when the gear is up and an AoA of 12° or 15.5° if you so desire by pressing the 15.5° button. The entire computer suite does feel restrictive but it is good enough to make your life easier while flying. The thrust reverser is the cherry on top of the cake, allowing you to land almost everywhere you want provided that there is at least 500m of level terrain, preferably paved but gravel will do. If you get the Viggen, use this even if it is just to do donuts in reverse to make fun of other inferior aircraft that lack reverse capability. Overall, this is a wonderful little machine with quirks upon quirks that make her special. Here is the sample of the compressor stall, notice the warning that precedes it: MISSION CAPABILITY This is an area in which the Viggen both shines and is at its worst, at least to me. To understand the Viggen's role one must put itself in the shoes of 1970's Sweden. At this time a Soviet invasion was a real possibility, one that was taken so seriously that the entire Swedish Armed Forces were built around it. The Air Force, specifically, had as a requisite that all Swedish Air Force front-line fighters were to be able to operate from short/damaged airfields or even road-side bases in the case the Soviets destroyed all the runways. A PRODUCT OF ITS TIME For that reason, the Viggen we have in game (the AJS-37, not the JA-37) has a very specific role in mind: Anti-ship and low-level precision strikes. This leaves the Viggen highly dependent on pre-planned targets and pop-up attacks that require specific target information to be performed successfully, primarily the target's QFE (atmospheric pressure). To be clear, this does not necessarily mean anything is wrong with the module, it is just that the DCS multiplayer environment does not lend itself that well to highly planned missions outside of smaller, more coordinated group sessions where pre-planned objectives can be followed. The Viggen can be operated on a target of opportunity basis too mainly thanks to the amazingly done ground radar that the module has, but at that point you are missing some of what makes the Viggen such a capable aircraft despite its shortcomings. I love this aircraft but I find myself flying it less than what I would like for this very fact, but for some odd reason I still keep coming back and flying it more. ARMAMENT AKAN GUN PODS 150 rounds (per pod) of 30mm-sized death at 1300RPM. These are for when you want to kill something and you do not know much about it. They can be used for both air to air and air to ground roles. They are pretty accurate, if you aim right. RB-24 / RB-24J SIDEWINDER MISSILES As with the F-5E-3, these are the only dedicated air to air weapons you will have aside from the gun pods. You have access to two variants: the RB-24J (AIM-9P) and an RB-24 (AIM-9L). They are easily spoofed by flares so you better pack several of them. ARAK ROCKET PODS The most fun you will have with the Viggen, period. These are 135mm in diameter making them deadly even against well reinforced armor. These pods empty in only 0.6 seconds , spitting a figurative wall of death and destruction in the direction of the poor souls who dare stand in front of you. Oh, and they can be used for both pre-planned and unplanned targets. RB-75 MAVERICK One of the only precision guided munitions, and in fact, the only one that has its dedicated TV scope mounted to the side of the HUD (see second picture by clicking the arrow). These are your standard Maverick missiles, so nothing really out of the ordinary. A cool weapon nonetheless, though. M/71 GENERAL PURPOSE BOMBS Capable yet a bit lacking in firepower due to their 120Kg mass, these bombs rely on their numbers to carpet bomb an area into oblivion. There is also an illumination variant that will turn the darkest night into daytime in less time that I empty my ARAK pods. RB-05 RADIO CONTROLLED AIR TO SURFACE MISSILE Manually guided by you, the pilot, this missile will follow your directions to its last moment. Capable of air to ground and air to air thanks to its proximity fuse capability. They are quite a lot of fun once you get used to them. RB-04 ANTI-SHIP MISSILE Packing their own radar, these oddly shaped missiles are the older option for anti-shipping operations. Once launched, they will find their own target and give it a date with Poseidon. RB-15 ANTI-SHIP MISSILE A more modern alternative for the anti-shipping business, these missiles do not screw around. They can be pre-programmed with their own waypoints and search patterns, making them a lot more complicated than the RB-04, in theory. In practice, you can just designate a target with your radar and call it a day. BK-90 CLUSTER MUNITIONS A.K.A MJOLNIR The wrath of Thor will fall upon your enemies once you throw these out. The only thing that they are missing are lightning bolts coming out of them. They are truly bringers of destruction if employed correctly, which can be tricky. They have both an AP and HE variants. COUNTERMEASURES AND ELINT Lacking internal countermeasures aside from the radar warning receiver, the Viggen has to rely on external pods for self-defense countermeasures. One pod for chaff and flares (right) and one for ECM (left). This can be a bit frustrating as you have to give away two of your pylons just to have the ability to defend yourself against missiles. ELINT allows you to do recon-stuff, data gathering and most things of that nature. Some servers have it implemented as a core feature so it can be useful under some circumstances. EASE OF USE AND LEARNING CURVE This is the only part that makes me weary of recommending the Viggen to some of my friends. To put it bluntly, this aircraft is not for everyone. Not because of bugs or anything like that, but because of how different it is from every other aircraft out there. Everything from the cockpit layout to the weapon management system is just alien. Well, as alien as Sweden can be. It was an aircraft designed in-house for the needs of the Swedish nation with little to no external influence at all. This is not a bad thing, it is just something that someone has to get used to first prior to enjoying the Viggen for what it is. It does have its good parts. DESIGN DIFFERENCES For instance, the HUD design relies much more on symbology than, for example, American aircraft. It is absolutely brilliant in its application but for someone transitioning from an A-10C or a F-16C, the HUD might look bare and unintuitive; which it is not. It is in fact rather well designed and allows you to take all the information you might need at a simple glance. A sign of a good design. This is not a novice-friendly aircraft either, mainly due to the way one interacts with the data computer. The keypad, (top of the right console in the cockpit pictures of the first section), is the only way you can interact with it. It relies on a lot of codes to do certain things, like program RB-15 missiles. It is not the worst I have seen, so there is that as well. To summarize: I really don't recommend this aircraft for beginners as the learning process can be quite complicated. But, don't let me discourage you from taking up the challenge. If you feel like you can do it, then go for it! SINGLE PLAYER CONTENT This module comes with two campaigns that are linked narratively. These campaigns offer quite a lot of fun and showcase the pre-planned mission potential that the Viggen has in a way that many other campaigns fail to accomplish. I sincerely recommend trying these out even while you are learning the module. Even if it is just to hone your skills a bit more in something other than a simple training mission. IS THIS MODULE FOR YOU? If what you want in a module is: To break space-time on the deck. A very interesting avionics suite. An excellent flight model with a tons of room for fun. A Swedish masterpiece. If you don't mind: The design differences that come with indigenous aircraft. The somewhat limited dogfighting capabilities. The excessively steep learning curve for a novice. Having a lot of patience and time to learn how to use it. If all or some of the above is what you want, then Heatblur's AJS-37 Viggen is for you. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

IL-2 Great Battles is a game filled with wonderful aircraft from two of the most important eras of aviation: World War 1 and World War 2. From the humble yet powerful Albatros D.Va to Germany's wunderwaffe, the Me-262. This game is filled with legends of wartime aviation like almost no other game out there, even without considering that a new expansion is coming. Today, we wanted to give one of these legends, the P-38J Lightning, the spotlight in the first article of our new Plane Spotlight series. We will take a look at the aircraft, some of its history and how the game represents it. Without further ado, let's jump in! INTRODUCTION Designed by Lockheed-Martin, the P-38 is one of those aircraft that is instantly recognizable for its unique silhouette and intimidating profile that inspires both admiration and awe. It strays from more conventional aircraft design philosophies of the era by utilizing a twin boom design with the pilot located between them, "suspended" on a nacelle which also held the guns and cannon. This configuration was also used similarly on an another similarly unique-looking aircraft such as the German Fw-189 and the P-61 Black Widow, another american aircraft. Due to this wing configuration it is also equipped with a tricycle landing gear, a feature only a few aircraft of the era had but one that would become the norm with the birth of the jet. The Lightning had many variants made throughout the war, but the one present in IL-2 Great Battles as a Collector aircraft is the late-war P-38J-25. This is, in my opinion, the pinnacle of this aircraft's design. It includes better engines with a better intercooler and, most importantly, dive recovery flaps that aided in solving the P-38's most important problem: loss of control due to compressibility. For those who do not know, the P-38 was designed before compressibility was a known physical effect. In fact, it was one of if not the first American aircraft that suffered from this. During testing, this aircraft demonstrated adverse effects when crossing a certain speed threshold (usually above or around Mach 0.65) which made it borderline unrecoverable during a dive. The J-25 models and some older ones (J-10 and J-20) were fitted/retro-fitted with a dive recovery system in the form of an airbrake/dive flap which eliminated much of this issue. The Lightning is an aircraft that in its time pushed engineering to its limits and one that many pilots trusted their lifes to, becoming the one that made some of them aces over the Pacific and Europe. THE BEAUTIFUL LINES OF THE LIGHTNING In IL-2 Great Battles, the P-38 has been beautifully represented. Every bolt, seam and panel has been modeled to a very high degree of detail. What impressed me the most were the visible marks of wear and tear that an aircraft would have, it does not look like a factory-new aircraft. The area around the intercooler has a lot of oil as it should, and notice one more thing; the oil splatters follow the direction of the airflow. Look at the propeller's spinner and see how the oil follows the rotational direction of the prop, amazing. This is simply-put, a beautiful depiction of a spectacular aircraft. The cockpit is equally well-made. All the gauges are there and mostly correspond with this model of P-38. My only gripe about this and all other aircraft in IL-2 Great Battles that I can not interact or click any of this gorgeous cockpit unlike how I would be able on IL-2 Cliffs of Dover/Desert Wings. I would love to click and move around all the levers and switches. The following images are a gallery, click the arrows to scroll around! FLYING AND FIGHTING IN THE LIGHTNING To be completely honest, I love the way it flies. I do not know what it is but it feels a bit better than some of the other aircraft in the game. It has more weight to it and it does not lack in engine power, which makes it feel a bit more like a flying battering ram. It lacks a bit of maneuverability but that is natural considering that it is heavier and larger than something like a Spitfire or a Mustang. Another part that I really like about the Lightning is how the superchargers spool up as speed increases. This is characteristically distinctive of the Allison V-1710 engines equipped on the aircraft, which aided it in high altitude performance and endurance. Here, have a listen: The best role that the P-38 can do is, in my opinion, that of a fighter-bomber. It can carry a lot of ordinance for a very long distance with the added bonus of being able to defend itself from enemy fighters with its four .50 caliber machine guns and its singular 20mm cannon. Do not get me wrong, this is an aircraft that can dogfight if the pilot manages its energy well, but there are better and more maneuverable fighters on the Allies' roster which are much more easier to dogfight on than the Lightning. Oh, by the way, sometimes all it takes is a single hit of your 20mm cannon to decimate the enemy aircraft. Really satisfying. CONCLUSIONS If I had to buy just one of the Collector aircraft for IL-2 Great Battles, it would be this one. It is versatile, unique and a lot of fun to fly. It has showed me that sometimes it does matter if you can dogfight on an aircraft but that you can also have fun doing boom-and-zoom attacks on enemy aircraft and ground-pounding airbases into oblivion. The Lightning will serve you well- About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

This article is dedicated to my dear friend Gabriel, who is the helicopter pilot that first opened my eyes to the wonders of the rotary wings so many years ago. Thank you so much. For a lot of years I have felt a sense of awe when looking at a helicopter, be them civilian or military. I have fond memories of spending hours upon hours on a mall's terrace as a child, looking at the only airport that my city has and the air traffic that came and went. Many of those hours were spent looking at helicopters, mainly at the Twin Hueys and Mi-2s that the national Air Force had based there. I always liked them but it never beat the feeling of a King Air 200 passing 100 feet above me on final approach. It was not until my country, for good or bad, decided to acquire some Mi-26 helicopters that I realized how amazing helicopters were, not only as aircraft but as marvels of human engineering. When I saw the Mi-26 fly, I was shocked at the sound and the sheer size of it. In fact, I was so impressed that between me and my friends we always called them the "Flying Whales". But my real life amazement for helicopters was not one that I shared in simulators. For years all I ever used were fixed wing aircraft, for reasons which I can not pin-point with accuracy. Maybe it was the speed of the fighters or the comforting sound of a turboprop, I really do not know why I was and am so drawn to fixed wing aircraft. I, willingly, never gave any helicopter a chance in any of the simulators I have had since the early 2000's. It wasn't until recently when I finally decided that I would give the rotary wings a go, both for my sake of trying something different and to allow myself to create more diverse content for the website. But I was not willing to take a full dive into helicopters just yet, hence why my first ever experience with rotary wings was the Kamov Ka-50. I had previously heard that the Ka-50 was a highly automated machine with tons of autopilot aid which should make the flying experience much more friendly to a novice. And in fact, what I heard was true. It was a bit tricky at first because I was not used to using my throttle as a collective, which led to some very embarrassing crashes. Once I got used to it, it became second nature to me so I started doing more interesting things with the Kamov, such as cargo lifting and scout operations in multiplayer servers. But it didn't take me long to realize that the Ka-50 does not offer the true helicopter experience I was searching for. I was not using my "anti-torque" pedals as much as I thought, nor was I correcting for many undesirable effects. Hovering it was a piece of cake, even without the auto-hover being enabled. In my eyes, it felt much more like a fighter aircraft than a helicopter. For a complete summary of my feelings on the Kamov, and why I like it despite everything, I suggest you check out my DCS: Ka-50 Black Shark 2 review. During the last DCS sale, I took the decision to buy the UH-1H for review purposes but-oh- how it surprised me. I went in thinking that this would be different experience when comparing it with the Kamov but I did not expect it to be a figurative night and day difference. The Huey is a very different beast, one that requires much more attention. I found myself not only enjoying myself but I also found myself having the same feeling of amazement that I had in real life. I will not lie, it took me a while to adjust from the Kamov to the Huey but now that I feel confident enough in my flying I can truly understand what I was missing with the Ka-50. I went from barely using my pedals in level flight to using them constantly. The way I use the cyclic and the pedals is much more different than how I used it on the Kamov, with the Huey requiring much more hand-foot coordination in order to counteract the torque. Torque was the main thing missing from the Kamov but that is to be expected due to its co-axial rotor system. This experience changed my mind when it comes to appreciating the work of a helicopter pilot and the precision one has to have in day-to-day operations. I also realized that a fixed wing aircraft is inherently stable by design, which makes them much more simple to fly in most scenarios. To put it bluntly, in a fighter aircraft I find fun by employing the weaponry that they have, in the Huey I find fun just by the sheer experience of flying it. Hence, the title of this article. The DCS Huey is the digital helicopter that convinced me to stop worrying about the complexity of learning a helicopter and taught me how to love them. I can not wait to see how the DCS: Mi-24P, the Mi-8 or any other helicopters differ from this one once I get my hands on them, consider me impressed. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

After many years of anticipation and a long development cycle, Project Wingman finally took off on December 1st, 2020. This game, which takes heavy inspiration from other flight arcade titles but primarily from Project Aces' Ace Combat franchise, has a lot going for it but at the same time there are some things that do need to be addressed. As usual with my reviews I will separate this into several categories so that you, the reader, can formulate your own judgement as to whether this game is for you: Introduction and origins Environments, art style and UI design 3D assets and Textures Story Gameplay Conquest Mode Day-one bugs/problems and the future Is this game for you? Thanks to Prov, Hueman, Ribbon-Blue and BillytheKid for their contributions to this article. Also, thanks to Humble Games for the press copy of the game, much appreciated! DISCLAIMER: Humble Games gave us complete creative freedom over this review and the opinions that will be written are my own. WARNING: This review will contain spoilers for this game's story. These will be contained in the STORY section of the review or when explicitly disclaimed. INTRODUCTION AND ORIGINS Project Wingman (PW) as a game has its roots all the way back in 2016 with the first 0.1.0 Alpha versions of the game. These, as its natural for very early WIP builds, were very rough but showed a lot of promise from the very beginning. After two years of development and various very interesting public demo releases, the developers decided to start a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter to fund the project in order to be able to develop a fully fledged-out game. The team was a small group of three individuals, the most crucial of them all being RBD2, the main developer/art designer/sound designer/almost everything game dev related behind the game. He served as the driving force behind the project, being the one that started it all. Alongside him were FlyAwayNow, the Producer Manager, and Jose Pavli, the song writer behind the game's soundtrack. A small thing with very big goals. Unsurprisingly, their goal of 35.000AUD was not only met but surpassed threefold with a total of around 115.000AUD having been raised by the end of the campaign. The demo version of the game which was tailored as a showcase for the Kickstarter campaign is still available. After two more years of final development and a couple of delays, the game finally dropped on December 1st, 2020 to very positive public reception. Now, let's go look at the game itself. ENVIRONMENTS, ART STYLE AND UI DESIGN Even at the very start, with the first alpha builds of the game, PW has had a rather unique art style and art direction while also letting itself be inspired by UI layouts from other flight games. The color pallet used seems to be more grounded, less flashy which lends itself really well to the somewhat prevalent bleakness of the environments.The game was built around Unreal Engine 4, which does lend itself to some absolutely stunning visuals if utilized correctly. Environments are varied as well. From mountainous regions to deserts, oil rigs, lava deposits, cities and tropical islands. I think it is better if I show you some examples so you can judge for yourself (POSSIBLE LOCATION SPOILERS). The UI is very stylish, opting for a sort of canted and angled look to its elements which blends well with the rest of the game while also allowing for a bit more viewing space for the player. I have some small critiques such as the use of post processing on the UI itself which can make it look fuzzy and unfocused. There is also the difficulty in reading some of the distant UI elements of the HUD such as the names on named Ace enemies. One fact that I do like about the UI is that it is rather customizable, allowing the player to change its color, scaling and even the subtitle position on the screen. A good UI is one that gives the players all the information they need without getting in the way and this one surely accomplishes that. It is also worth mentioning that the developers are still tweaking some aspects of the maps, which they have already done by giving a couple of maps a lighting re-work that fixed some of the complaints that the community had (patch 1.0.4C). This is something I will mention later in greater detail, but the fact that the devs are listening to the bug reports is very important. Another very important aspect of this game is its soundtrack. Composed by Jose Pavli, this OST has a lot of amazing songs that fit the game very well. One of the best examples I can give is Mission 11's song, Showdown. It is a song that reminded me of one of the most famous songs from Ace Combat 04, Comona. But it also does not let the inspiration take control and defines itself very well. Have a listen: The only factor that I will "critique" about the OST is that it sometimes gets a bit buried by the sounds of battle and the gameplay itself. The songs have delicate arrangements that end up lost by the factors I have already mentioned. But I sincerely love the OST and believe that its composer did a fantastic job, regardless of the shortcomings. 3D ASSETS, TEXTURES AND EFFECTS This area is a hit and miss, a constant that will become apparent on other areas of the game. And please, do not get me wrong, as we have to look at everything with context in mind. This is a game that was made by a small team, and the word small there seems kind of huge. There are also budget limitations and certain things take priority, things which I will expand upon later in the review. Aircraft external models and their textures are pretty spot on, they look sweet. The 3D models are very nicely rigged and animated, the control surfaces move with some weight to them and do not make exaggerated movements. The textures also look like they do belong on a post-apocalyptic mercenary group, having marks of extensive use and chipped/weathered sections that have not being touched up in a while. Overall, pretty neat. This also applies to the enemy aircraft, although appreciating them in the heat of battle is quite the challenge. To me, the best part of this game's world-building is shown through the modeling and detail that was put into this game's most iconic enemies, its airships: These behemoths fit into this world's aesthetic fantastically. The detail that was put into modeling these beasts should not be understated. But not everything can be sunshine and rainbows. Every playable aircraft has its own 3D cockpit model. These range from pretty alright to obvious asset reuse. Don't get me wrong, asset reuse is very justifiable under certain scenarios as it allows developer to have a bit more time and resources that would be rather be spent on more critical areas. But something like what I will show next is not: To the left is the F/C-16 and to the right is the cockpit of the Chimera, an original superplane prototype. To me this is nothing bad, more so when one can see that the Chimera was inspired by the F-16XL prototype. But it is undeniable that the Chimera's cockpit is nothing more than a F/C-16 cockpit that was tinted red and without the HUD frame. None of them look bad, to me this is just a missed opportunity that would have made the Chimera stand out a bit more. What is a bit worse is that some textures are clearly being reused over numerous aircraft, with some of them being quite evident as it is the case of what I will call "the green circle screen". This is one of many textures that are present on several of the cockpits, but mostly on those that have multi function displays (MFDs). The worst of these cases is the one present on the Sk.27's right screen. Take a look for yourself: It is clear that this texture was made for square screens. So grabbing it and enlarging it to cover the space of a rectangular screen just makes it look disproportionate. I have talked with several other people and most of them pointed out this to me as well, so I am not the only one that noticed it. I am sure that this is something rather easy to fix as it is a texture, so I do expect that the devs will fix it in the long run, at least when they have fixed some of the other bugs that deserve more attention. The cockpits are not the prettiest but they get the job done, I just wished that they were of the same quality and style as the external models. Yet another problem that I have is with the quality of the ground textures. Sure, you won't be flying close or slow enough to the ground to notice it most of the time. But when it shows, it shows: Coming back on a good note, let's talk about something more positive: the visual effects. Explosions are wonderfully made and emit just the right amount of glow, making them illuminate the smoke that they produce. Here is an example taken by BIllyTheKid, who kindly provided several screenshots for us to use. As you can see, particles effects are pretty well done and the explosions have this "oomph" to them that make them satisfying to watch. A fantastic job, if you ask me. STORY (SPOILER WARNING) From a point of view of complete honesty, I have my reservations with some parts of the story. But let me start from the beginning, as it is important that we are on the same level of knowledge. The following recap is very rough, so a lot of subtleties will be lost: You play as "Monarch", a mercenary working for the Sicario Mercenary Group, specifically for the Hitman Squadron. The game starts with you finishing the last part of a contract for a client (The Federation), which has you attacking another group of mercenaries. At the end of the mission, yet another group of mercenaries informs you that civil war has broken on the country of Cascadia as they seek independence from the Federation. So your boss, taking advantage of the situation, sends you Cascadia's way to join the Cascadian Independent Forces. The story moves from point to point, introducing certain aspects of the world and the story as missions pass. From your antagonist to certain aspects of your own squadron mates. You face against the antagonist (Crimson squadron) several times, each time you leave an impression on them as the only mercenary that can challenge them. The war continues and your momentum is impressive, annihilating Federation forces. It was not until very late in the war that the Federation decided to go a bit "nuclear". They cause a second calamity on the city of Prospero, leaving almost no survivors and causing a chain reaction that created a new uninhabitable zone on the continent. In the midst of the calamity, you fight another squadron of mercenaries that are trying to hunt you down, they know your real identities. The fact that they know who you and your squadmates are means that you will be hunted down by mercenaries and bounty hunters. The Cascadian government offers you a deal, a deal that will make sure that your identity's reveal does not mean anything after the war, total protection. You survive through the calamity by hunkering down on an improvised airfield (which in actuality is an incomplete highway) until the worst passes. After two months, your squadron starts attacking the remnants of the Federation's army that are still alive on Cascadian territory, including Crimson squadron who you shoot down in its entirety. You make the Federation retreat until the fight ends during the final attack to retake Cascadia's capital, Presidia. It was a long battle but little by little you take apart the Federation's forces until, at the last minute, a ceasefire is settled during a diplomatic meeting. Frustrated by the decision, you accept it reluctantly. It is at this time that the radar fills with more cordium missiles, the same ones that were used to destroy Prospero. Presidia falls and all of your allies are presumed dead (although some after you finish the game on Mercenary it's revealed that some survived). The only ones flying are you and the man behind the cordium attack, Crimson 1, who is flying a prototype aircraft. You proceed to have one final dogfight against him, besting him and shooting him down. Then, the credits roll, the deal was honored. Now, to my opinion. This story needed more time and room to breath. It's pace is fast and leaves you no time to reflect on the actions of the characters, their motivations or their personalities. The game's lack of cutscenes of any kind (apart from one that sincerely does not really count as it is a single static image for a 4 minute long dialogue) really impacts the story. The game overly relies on in-mission dialogue to develop the characters, which is not good as much of the game has very intense gameplay that necessitates the player focus, making it a bit difficult to pay attention to the subtitles or even the voices. Some of the game's characters come out as flat and shallow because of this, the best example being Crimson 1. Crimson needed more in-screen time to explain his motivations. His actions during the final mission have left many players, including myself, blaming him for ruining the pace and claiming that his actions blew the story out of proportion. If the game would have had some cutscenes, even static images à la Ace Combat 04, from Crimson's POV. That could have made the player understand his feelings on an out-of-mission setting, maybe even accomplishing on making the ending have a different impact on me and on many other's perspectives. The destruction of Prospero felt impactful, it felt like it showed the Federation's true evil side. They were so desperate as to blow up the commercial hub of Cascadia just to stop the advancing Cascadian forces without even caring about the civilians or the consequences. But the destruction of Presidia, on the other hand, felt completely unnecessary. Moments like that have to be used sparingly, because the feeling of despair is one that has to be earned. You had already seen the destruction that Cordium can cause, you saw your base in ruins. That was more than enough to prove that the Federation was evil. Presidia's fall felt undeserved, rushed or even questionable. Instead of feeling anger or despair from seeing it in that sorry state, I felt a deep sense of confusion and disappointment. I do believe that the game and its world have great promise, there is an evident amount of care that was put into the setting, but the execution behind the story hurt it. GAMEPLAY This is where Project Wingman shines. It's gameplay is one of the best - if not the best - I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing on an arcade flight game. The sense of flight is very well represented and planes feel like they have weight to them. Is it realistic? No, and that does not matter. An arcade flight game is meant to be fun and to give the player a nice sensation of flight, and Project Wingman does that in spades. Weapons feel fun to use, none of them being too gimmicky or difficult to use. My only complaint would be that the reticle for the unguided bombs is a bit hard to use as it does not really allow the player to judge depth. But besides that the most satisfying weapon to use by far is the gun, both internal and gun pods. The gun pipper is accurate and the time to kill is just right. Overall, I have no more to comment other than that they nailed it! Last but not least, I want to talk a bit about the way Project Wingman handles special weapons (SP) because it is noteworthy. Unlike with other flight arcade games this one uses a "Pylon" system, allowing the player much more loadout freedom than they would have had otherwise. Some aircraft have more freedom than others, but each one has their own unique way of handling certain SP weapons. Speaking of aircraft, the roster will have a lot of familiar faces. It is ample enough to make the game feel like it does not lack variety but not enough to say that all the holes have been filled in the roster. The devs are planning on adding more aircraft down the line so be on the lookout for them! The biggest gameplay feature that this game has is its ability to be played entirely with a VR headset, I will now quote another Skyward staff member, Ribbon-Blue, as he talks a bit about the VR impressions of the game (he will go in-depth with them on an upcoming article): One very positive thing that virtual reality in Project Wingman does have going for it (intentional or not) is that by being forced to use cockpit view, players really can take in the visual style this game is pushing. There is a lot of weather detail and lighting that is missed when flying in third person or HUD views. The canopies actually have scratches and scuffs, missions like Eminent Domain became way more intense because of the absolutely overwhelming amount of weather. Other missions that have low light or haze have more impact and do change the way you approach combat. I noticed myself actively avoiding weather in certain situations, looking for holes in the clouds to go through and really having to pay attention to my HUD when descending through the cloud deck to avoid colliding with terrain. VR being available in both Campaign and Conquest is a huge plus for this game. Even if it could be a slightly better experience in some aspects, I keep needing to remind myself this game was made by such a small team. CONQUEST MODE Do you want the thrill of the gameplay but none of the story? Then Conquest mode is for you. Conquest mode allows you to "transform" Project Wingman into a rogue-like game. It is one of the best aspects of this game, to be honest. You can conquer territory over the period of one run, gain points, arm your own personal airfleet full of fighters and airships. As you conquer the territories, your alert level will go up and with it, the difficulty. But, the moment you die or crash, it is game over. Your progress gets reset with only one exception: your unlocked aircraft and your "prestige points" which are nothing more than fancy credits. This game mode adds a lot of replay value to the game and makes the Project Wingman experience last a bit longer. DAY-ONE BUGS/PROBLEMS AND THE FUTURE It is important to mention that this game, at the day of its release, had an incredible amount of problems and complications. Some of them were not that severe but others were so bad that they made some people's games not even boot up correctly. I personally did not encounter any game-breaking bugs but some of my friends encountered issues with their drivers, others had Unreal Engine 4 issues, others were able to boot up for some time and after closing the game and opening it again, the game refused to boot and crashed instantly until they moved it to a secondary drive. Other issues that people encountered ranged from enemies spawning underground, boss fights having unfair strategies and unclear mechanics, clouds tiling up and looking like waffles from up top, etc. The only issue that I personally found, and ones that I still have, are severe UI scaling issues on 5:4 aspect ratio screens and severe slowdowns during certain scenarios. I have already reported this one to the devs. VR users are still having problems but some of the biggest issues have already been solved. Project Wingman seemed to have launched very rough around the edges, with a lot of unpolished features. We do not know why it launched this way or why they moved forward the release date to December 2020 when they had stated that the game was going to release in 2021. I, personally, would have gladly accepted a delay or the already announced 2021 release window if it meant a more polished game at launch. Yet, here we are. The devs have said that they are focused on bug fixing and that they are even working on adding more planes and features to the game. I sincerely appreciate this from them as it shows that they listen and that they do care about their game. Well done. IS THIS GAME FOR YOU? At an asking price of 24.99USD, Project Wingman has a lot to offer for a very low price. It is not a perfect game and some of its flaws are pretty apparent even to the most diehard of fans. I will just say this: Project Wingman showed that you do not need a big team or a big budget to make something great, all you need is the will to make it happen. If what you want in a game is: Awesome gameplay Thrilling dogfights A replayable gamemode with hours of entertainment A different experience than other flight games A fully VR compatible flight experience A game with modding potential If you don't mind: A story with room to improve Some bugs and performance dips That the game is not a simulator (not a flaw, but there are some people that only like sims) If you agree with all of the above, then RBD2's Project Wingman is for you. Again, thanks to everyone that helped me with this review and to Humble Games for the copy. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

Digital Combat Simulator (DCS) is a game that has positioned itself as one of the only surviving modern combat flight simulators of this decade, with its only competition coming from games such as Falcon BMS, which is not technically its own game and more of a community overhaul of a 1999' game. Titles such as IL-2 Great Battles could also count as competition as they do have partial overlaps with regards of WW2 combat, but nothing more. To put it frankly, DCS is the only one doing proper modern combat simulation as of the writing of this article. A big part of what makes DCS, well, DCS; are its aircraft. From propeller-driven warbirds of old to modern marvels of technology, it has something for everyone. Most of these aircraft are simulated to a very high degree, which requires the player to learn them in a similar manner as they would on a real aircraft. This includes a lot of procedures and check-lists to operate the aircraft systems such as radars, targeting pods, guided and unguided weaponry, etc. Are they 100% true to their real-life counterparts? No, and probably for the better as many of the fighters in the sim are still in-service with nations that would very much like some of the things that these fighters have to be kept as secret. What matters is that they are modeled well enough to not cross that line and still give the player one hell of an experience. With this complexity comes a certain learning curve that can, in some cases, be pretty stiff and unforgiving. To get an aircraft from cold and dark to mission ready is a bit of a challenge the first time you pick up an module, no matter if you are a new or experienced player. You will have to do research, read or watch tutorials on how to do the most basic of stuff before you get to the more complex systems and their operations. But this is where I find most of my enjoyment and the main reason why I dedicate a big chunk of my free time to DCS. I have never had the same feeling of getting a laser bomb hit on a target after practicing for almost two days-worth of training to get it right on any other game. It is a feeling that only simulators can give you as they allow you to master your skills. It is that same feeling that drives me to learn more and more about the aircraft that I fly to know about their systems, the way they function and how to interact with them to use them to the maximum, be them combat aircraft or otherwise. But as I said previously, this does not make the learning curve less stiff or harsh. It is only natural that a combat aircraft will have complex systems that need to be managed in order to be combat effective. While I personally find enjoyment in learning to fly these aircraft, I have also heard the opposite from many others. It is an activity that is very time consuming and you already have to have an interest in these things to try them. It is not so much about difficulty as I do believe that everyone is capable of learning anything if they put their minds to it, but more about about time and dedication. In addition, while I cannot get the same feelings from them as I do from a sim, I also enjoy arcade flight games quite a lot (this website has quite a few examples of that). From the more recent Project Wingman to classic Ace Combat games and everything in between. One noteworthy example being Strike Fighters 2, as it brings some of that sim-like excitement without the learning curves of an in-depth sim. But there is just something that DCS has that makes it shine a bit more in my eyes, making it one of those games that I always come back to either to relax after a long day or to learn something new. It must be all the years I have spent playing flight sims, but I have really learnt how to find satisfaction in their complexity and I hope you have too. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

This is going to be a more personal and less formal piece, as it is one that deserves a bit more emotion and openness due to the circumstances that this year brought to many of us. But this will be an article about how this year was very positive for us at Skyward and how you, our readers, have allowed us to do some pretty cool stuff with some very interesting people. Let's start, well, from the very beginning. We rebranded from Project Lighthouse to Skyward Flight Media back in March to search of more creative freedom and a broader set of topics we could tackle aside from Ace Combat. It was a bit scary but I am glad we did it. Since then we have covered many other franchises and expanded our horizons into a more diverse and healthy pool of titles and content types. This year we also did many interviews and collaborations, from shouting out content creators such as the Flight Sim Historian to interviewing groups such as the Frecce Tricolori Virtuali or developers like the wonderful Why485. It has been a very pleasant experience to interact with every single person or group we interviewed this year, thank you so much to everyone who accepted our proposals. We also created different content from what we were used to back in the Project Lighthouse days, such as the series of in-depth reviews of Digital Combat Simulator: World modules that we have available. These take a lot of time to write as they require a considerable amount of research to be able to publish them up to our own standards of quality. Oh, and since I am the one that writes them, I like to give them my own personal touch my making a personalized skin for each and every single aircraft I have reviewed, with the exception of the F-5E and the MB-339 (back when it was a mod and not an upcoming module). Here are the skins that I've created so far for review purposes; I am planning on making them available as soon as the next review is out in January 2021: This year was also the first in which we have received press copies of games and expansions, allowing us to cover games that we wouldn't have been able to. Such was the case with Desert Wings TOBRUK, Project Wingman and IndiaFoxtEcho's MB-339 for FS2020, the first two being some of the most extensive reviews that we have on this site. These opportunities have been crucial in our growth and we appreciate them a lot. Even though this year has been full of struggles and hardship, we were able to grow and expand in a way we were not expecting and for that, from all of the Skyward team, I want to thank everyone who read our articles and explored our website this year. It means the world to us and that is not an understatement. Now, onto more exciting things, let's take a peak into our preliminary plans moving forward into 2021! For 2021 we plan to expand our operations with more dedicated staff, and primarily a third dedicated writer. We also plan to expand our content creation to the video space around Q2 of 2021 with both casual and high production videos. These things are not set in stone but we will make sure to post updates with our plans as soon as they are set. That being said, we will be taking the first two weeks of January to plan out the year and make sure everything's being accounted for. We'll be back in force on the second week of January 2021 with more articles and interviews, so be prepared for those. We'll see you next year. Cheers! About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

If I were to ask you what makes DCS interesting and distinct, what would your answer be? I could guess that a varied range of answers could arise: from the people that love the action of close-in dogfight on both jets and props, to the folks that love dropping death from above with bombs; and those who prefer low level flying with helicopters or the few that enjoy tank combat! But, aside from a couple of helicopters, we have not seen a specific type of gameplay which could be beneficial in bringing combined arms and air corps close by bridging the gap: Cargo. I know that this opinion is not one that is shared by many, but I ask of you to at least read what I want to say here as I think I have a proposition for everyone who has any doubts. Last year, a modder known as Anubis released a mod which is not only unique but one that has no precedent in the game: a relatively high fidelity C-130J Super Hercules with a clickable cockpit and an EFM (external flight model). This mod allowed me to have my first taste of what could be possible with a heavy cargo aircraft inside of the simulator. And I was immediately taken by surprise. I always used to think that flying a cargo aircraft would be boring and tedious, but I was proven wrong. Cargo aircraft are not only for hauling cargo to and from airbases, but they can also deliver it directly to the troops/civilians in need straight to them by dropping it via parachute or LAPES in the case of the Hercules (Low Altitude Parachute-Extraction System). With these capabilities, not even taking into account the mountable cannons, allow for some interesting mission scenarios for multiplayer sessions. One of which being a very interesting combined arms scenario which includes almost every playable vehicule type: "A group of soldiers, accompanied by a small armored regiment and attack helicopters, is in need of reinforcements. A group of F-16CM will escort a pair of C-130 loaded a paratrooper regiment and vehicules. The mission is to get the C-130s to their drop point and back to base safely." To me, this is a multiplayer mission which I would love to be a part of as I wouldn't even have to choose which part to play because, surprisingly, all of the components in this mission are player controlled in one way or another. Even the dropped vehicules cold be player-controlled once they are on the ground. That being said, at the moment this scenario would only be possible thanks to the C-130 mod. Which leads us to the question on the title: Do cargo aircraft have a place inside DCS World? To me, yes, they do. The C-130J mod has showed me how surprisingly fun tactical cargo aircraft can be in DCS; and, by looking at the way that the community has responded to this mod, I am not the only one that thinks that way. If, at any point in time, Eagle Dynamics were to release a high fidelity module of a tactical cargo aircraft; you can count me as a day-one buyer. Here's hoping that that happens one of these days. This mod can be found on this discord server, where it was originally published. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

The Hip is one of only two dedicated cargo helicopters capable of light combat in DCS World. It is the largest flyable helicopter in the simulator, with the capability of providing both close air support (CAS) and cargo lifting for the troops on the ground. These capabilities alone make it an outstanding module on its own, but with the upcoming Mi-24P; this helicopter will become a much more interesting piece of the DCS ecosystem. During the last free-to-play period, I dedicated myself to spending as much time as possible with the Hip to be able to write a short piece about it. So be warned, I am in no way an expert when it comes to this bird. Although, all I can say is that this experience made me want to buy it really hard. This is not a review, but an overview. There are things I will omit for the sake of brevity and to leave some points so that the inevitable review is a bit more complete and less redundant. With that being said, let's take a look at this beautifully ugly bird. A MISLEADING FRONT COVER, A TYPICAL SOVIET TOUCH My first impressions of the Hip came in the form of what I'd consider a, to put slightly, overwhelming sense of dread as I started at view from the pilot's seat. To put this into perspective, most of my time spent flying helos in DCS has been on the UH-1H Huey. I'd consider the Huey a relatively straight-forward helicopter when it comes to its learning curve as it has relatively few controls and a simple cockpit layout. The Mi-8, in the other hand... For a novice, this is a terrifying first impression. In fact, I had the same impression when I flew the Fishbed for the first time in DCS as well; but just like the Fishbed's, this cockpit layout is much more intuitive and simpler than at first glance. You will have to adapt to the very different design philosophy that the Soviet Union's design bureaus had, that's it. The moment that that clicks on your head, things start becoming easier to understand. I thought that I would have had to spend hours upon hours learning, but I was in the air only half an hour after learning how to start it up. Overall, it was easy enough. Compared to the Huey, it might be a handful to manage alone. Since you will have to switch around from one seat to the other to have easier access to certain panels, such as the armament panel that is on the co-pilot side or the top rows of instruments and circuit breakers that are easily accessible by the flight engineer/navigator. Sadly, it does NOT have multicrew as of the writing of this article, so you are stuck managing this bird on your own. A HEAVY ARMED BIRD THAT FLIES LIKE A FEATHER IN THE WIND (WITH EXCEPTIONS) I have got to say something: The Mi-8 flies much differently than I thought. Since it is a lot heavier than the Huey, I expected it to be sluggish and that it would require much more collective to get off the ground. Oh boy, how wrong I was. This thing has power, a LOT of power. It only takes a bit of collective to make it go and as long as you know how to manage your trim and activate the stability augmentation, it is also surprisingly easy to fly too! Despite everything I said until now, the Mi-8 does have some quirks which you will have to get used to. For instance, I found it much easier to fall into a ring vortex state than with the Huey. It could have been that my approaches were too steep, that I just lacked the experience with the type and my inexperienced self was flying it as if it just were a big Huey. It took me a bit to adjust to the small quirks and found myself enjoying flying it around both the Caucasus and the Persian Gulf with the same ease as with my other helos. It is, without a doubt a very interesting and fun bird to fly. There is just one thing left to address from the section header: armament. Sincerely, I was a bit underwhelmed by the armament but it is ok, this is supposed to be a cargo aircraft first, attack aircraft second. I still had enough variety to play around for a bit. There's something about these cargo aircraft showing their fangs that always brings a smile to my face, a smile that can only become larger by those waterfall-like casings falling out as my pods reign fire. Such a blast, quite literally! OVERVIEW CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE PLANS When it comes down to getting the job done, the Magnificent Eight will not disappoint. It is, as of now, the most capable cargo helicopter in the simulator in my humble opinion. But, just kike every module in this and all other simulators and games, the Hip does not exist on a vacuum. Against the venerable Huey, the Mi-8 is a great counterpart while also being unique and distinct from any other helicopter out there, both aesthetically and functionally. There is, however, a big "but" in this case; at least to me. Soon a certain, let's say, distant cousin of this craft that I am quite interesting in. The Hind is fast approaching and with it, a whole new world of possibilities arise. Joint missions where Hips and Hinds assault together, each complementing each other's flaws and shortcomings. Even with that said, if I could only choose between a Hind and a Hip, I would always pick the former. It has light troop carrying capabilities as well as a lot of power for sling loading cargo, oh, and do not forget that it carries a lot more of a punch when it comes to armament. The Mi-8, on the other hand, is more of a tactical cargo helo with an emphasis on troop transport and light combat. Nothing like its cousin, but close enough to form some parallels as to how these two will complement each other in the DCS ecosystem. At the moment, all we can do is wait for this Soviet duo to be reunited in DCS. Hopefully, it will be sooner rather than later. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

If there's a single resource that has proven to be a very knowledgeable source for learning everything IL-2 Great Battles related, it would have to be Requiem's channel. In our second entry of our Creator Highlight series, we wanted to give the spotlight to Requiem's Air Combat Tutorial Library. He is an online creator and airline pilot IRL who has one of the largest and most interesting libraries of educational flight simulation videos out there. Be it the basics of aircraft operation such as taxiing, landing or engine management or much more complex topics such as energy management or combat maneuvering, Requiem has always had something to fill me in about a certain flight simulator subject. Some highlights I'd like to make are his videos on air combat maneuvering (ACM). It is one of his longest running series which has taken different types of focus to better tackle different scenarios. In my honest opinion, one that still holds up when it comes to quality and usability as most of the things you can learn here can be applied to any flight sim, regardless of its complexity. Here is one of my personal favorites from that playlist, simply due to the fact that he takes a disadvantaged aircraft and uses it to surpass his adversary while explaining everything for us to learn: He has been at this for a long while too, with his earliest videos dating back to almost 6 years ago. Additionally, while he has been primarily focused on creating content around the IL-2 Great Battles series, he has started tackling DCS World as of late with his F-5E series of videos. If his DCS videos are as detailed as any other content he has made, there is nothing but awesome videos coming our way. His production quality is also impressively high, with detailed graphic explanations of topics that need them coupled with very good utilization of tools such as Tacview to illustrate. But to me, what makes his channel unique is his approach towards newcomers. From what I have seen during my years of watching his content, he is always very open to feedback and helps people that post questions in the comment section of his videos. This is something that I do not see that often anymore. Nowhere is this more noticeable than with Learn to Fly series on specific aircraft of the IL-2 Great Battles series. They are short but highly detailed, including everything you need to get up to speed with each aircraft. I have personally used them several times to refresh my knowledge on Boddenplatte's aircraft. Here is an example of this series that I'd recommend: To conclude: I couldn't recommend Requiem's channel more. I strongly suggest you give him some love on his channel or his Patreon, if you feel like supporting his creative efforts. We need more creators like him in the flight simulator scene. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

To say that the upcoming 2.7 update for DCS:World is one of the most anticipated ones that the simulator has ever received would be an understatement. I have not seen players this excited for a patch ever since the patch that brought in the new Eagle Dynamics Graphic Engine (EDGE) engine back in 2014. That is still one of the biggest leaps this program has received to date, alongside version 2.5 in 2018. But even after the EDGE update and all of the 2.X updates until now, there was still a very visual reminder (not going to mention all of the inner workings of the sim) that we were still flying under the same skies as we have always been: the clouds. Despite all of the improvements that they had received, you could always tell that under it all they were still those same old clouds from almost (if not more than) a decade ago. All of that is set to change with the new clouds that are going to be implemented in eleven days as of the writing of this article, with the drop of update 2.7 for the sim. With these new volumetric and much more realistic clouds, I expect that a general change to the weather system is also coming. Keep that in mind for the rest of this article as it will become important to comprehend some points. Also, keep in mind that I have not tried the clouds for myself and that I will have to assume some things for the sake of argumentation. Let's hope I am not proven wrong in two week's time. CAREFUL FLYING AHEAD Entering a storm should not be something that you do normally, yet, it is something I do constantly with the current DCS weather and clouds. If things change, this will no longer be an advisable thing to do if you value your aircraft or the time you have put into your flight. Avoiding dangerous clouds will become a normal thing to do, just like assessing the weather prior to and during your flight to see what will be needed to get from point A to point B in one piece. There is also something that substantiates my thoughts in regards to this. A week or so ago RAZBAM posted a couple of teaser pics like they tend to do, but one of the screenshots caught my eye more than the others: This is what, to my untrained eye, seems to be a weather radar display being implemented to the Mirage module. The fact that this feature is being added represents to me a bit of proof that weather conditions inside clouds will become more of a crucial aspect when it comes to flying in DCS: World. COMBAT INCONVENIENCES AND NEW PLAYSTYLES Another very important aspect that these new clouds will most likely change is combat strategies. Specifically, how players will both love and hate clouds in certain combat scenarios and mission types for a plethora of reasons. Weather over the mission area will affect the way that players engage targets. Let's say that you are on a precision strike mission with GBU-12 bombs (laser guided munition) and the area is unexpectedly covered with thick clouds, making it difficult or outright impossible to get a visual on your targets. You would, at that point, have to fly lower than the clouds or you could rely on a JTAC unit to lase for you as you drop your bombs blind. In the future, interactions like this could also be done with the upcoming Kiowa module playing as a FAC for the fighters! This would bring a completely different set of possible scenarios to the table, forcing the current playerbase to adapt and improve their combat strategies to fit the new aerial battleground. You will need to be more aware of your surroundings, cloud formations and how your enemies could use them against you. I do expect clouds to be used as visual cover while dogfighting, particularly in World War 2 scenarios. Hiding behind the clouds to ambush an enemy flight could be very fun or scary depending on which side are you on. Oh, and these kinds of scenarios would be most likely only be useful on multiplayer scenarios as the AI will most likely be all-seeing through the clouds, just like it is right now. That being said, yesterday I had a very small exchange with Jon Coughlin, one of our readers who interacts frequently with us on Twitter. He brought up an interesting point: most public multiplayer session run on clear weather conditions because of the playerbase. While he is right in that point, I sincerely expect that mission creators will utilize the new clouds to provide much richer environments, and while they might not all be full overcast conditions, it is always good to have some clouds than to have none. Additionally, I think that the low quality of the old clouds contributed to their rejection, which is something that the new ones do not have. IFR FLYING AND CONCLUSIONS The last thing I expect clouds to impact is primarily low visibility and night flying. IFR flying has the possibility to become much more important than ever before. This might force some people to learn how to use TACAN stations to navigate and use their ILS systems on landing to ensure that their precious aircraft does not end up as a very expensive firework show. From what I have always noticed in my years of flying sims, these systems are usually underutilized due to the fact that, as Jon said, most people prefer clear blue skies with no clouds, not even high altitude ones. I hope that with this update, more people will start using them to navigate through adverse weather and moon-less nights. To close this rather messy article, I wanted to share one last thing. A very dear friend of mine mentioned this quote from the great Antoine de Saint-Éxuperry which I think fits my feelings on the clouds both IRL and in-game perfectly: Navigating by the compass in a sea of clouds over Spain is all very well, it is very dashing... But you want to remember that below the sea of clouds lies eternity. Clouds might be beautiful things, floating with grace, but remember that they are treacherous and could hide your imminent death either behind or inside them. Stay safe, fly responsibly. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

I have been playing flight simulators for almost half my life and there is a constant that I always notice, no matter the platform I am currently flying on: the high new player turn-around rate that flight sims have. Be it because of of their high level of entry of flight sims, unintuitive controls or just the nicheness of the genre, flight simulation is the genre of games where I have personally seen the largest amount of people try it once and then turn around, never to return. DCS:World is not an exception to this trend. I have seen many try it out and leave without even spending more than two hours on it. But unlike some other sims, I have noticed that DCS has some characteristics that make it easier to get a hold off like interactive tutorials, in-house instructional videos made by the developers and many other things. Yet, I still think that just a couple of things could bring even more player into the game, long-term players at that. I have been thinking about writing this article for a while but it has been difficult as this is a topic that needs to be tackled seriously. Spitballing ideas is not something ideal in this situation as it might bring more confusion to the table. Additionally, remarking problems without bringing solutions to light is just like throwing gas into a fire; I will try to illustrate each problem and after that, I will propose a solution for it. Please take this as a passionate open letter from a lifelong flight sim enthusiast to the fantastic developers at Eagle Dynamics. It is my opinion and everything here just reflects what I think as someone that has observed the environment that surrounds this genre, its people and what some of them think. Oh, and I am not a gamedev, so this is only my opinion as an experienced player. With that out of the way, we shall begin. FIRST IMPRESSIONS MATTER A LOT It might sound like a simple thing, but it is one of the things that I have been told by several people who have tried DCS and turned away: when they opened the main menu for the first time, it "scared" them. With "scared", most of them told me that they meant that it looked unintuitive and that it does not provide any kind of assistance as a first time user. Sure, everything is labeled right there but as a new player it is kind of confusing. For long-time users this might be a non-issue as most of them already know how to navigate and, in general, most of them already knew what they were getting into when starting the program in the first place. This is something that only affects players that come from other games where initial tutorials are common. Therefore, my proposal: A guided tour on first start. This guided tour, which is something that other simulators use, would guide you through the UI via pop-up elements. It would tell you what each part of the menu does, what you can access with them, etc. After that, it would send you to the training section so that you can start your first training session. In my opinion, this would allow new players to familiarize themselves with DCS' menus and it'd get them started on their journey. HOW A DIFFICULT AIRCRAFT SETS WRONG EXPECTATIONS The second most common complaint I have heard from the people that I got to talk to to make this article is this: The starter plane is too difficult or variation of that statement such as "why do I have to start with a difficult aircraft?". These comments were in reference to the Su-25T, one of two free aircraft that come with DCS:World, the other being the TF-51 which is a full fidelity "training" unarmed variant of the P-51 Mustang. The Su-25T is, in my opinion, a wonderful ground pounder. It is capable of doing almost every single ground strike task you can think of, mostly thanks to its sensor package and weapon variety. I do not have any issues or complaints from my experienced user standpoint, but, is this really the best aircraft to be someone's first jet or aircraft as a whole? DCS is, to some, their first flight simulator. They will need to learn all the basics of flight before they even start thinking about combat. In my opinion, the Su-25T does not give new players the best impression. It is slow and most importantly, it is a temperamental bird that might appear unfriendly to the newcomers. The TF-51 is a much better trainer and it would be perfect if it were not for one reason: its lack of multicrew. I have personally taught several of my friends how to fly in DCS with the help of multicrew. Specifically, the aircraft I taught them with was the MB-339 mod since it allowed me to teach them without them having to spend anything on the sim. That is a very important part of this argument because the fact that they did not have to spend money at the start to begin training with a friend marked the difference between turning around and staying. I love what the modding community has done to alleviate this problem. One only needs to look at the marvelous work of the A-4E-C team (which I am glad to be a minor part of) or the highly expected T-45C by VNAO. Aircraft like those solve this issue, allowing newcomers to have a taste of DCS before they take the plunge into buying a module. Therefore, my proposal: DCS would benefit from a third free aircraft, an official multi-crew capable module capable of training missions. I know how expensive and difficult module creation is, I have seen it first hand. My proposal is not without flaws, either. Modules such as the L-39, C-101, YAK-15 and the IFE official MB-339 module, which is in development, exist for a reason and serve the exact role I think would benefit DCS in the long term: but they are all paid. A lot of newcomers would prefer buying a fully-fledged fighter like the Hornet instead of buying a module just for training, or so I have been told by the people I spoke with to make this article. It is all about accessibility and zero monetary compromise Having mods such as VNAO's T-45C is great for the community as a whole as they fix that hole that exists in accessible initial pilot training. But there is no official support for mods like these, their maintenance after each patch falls to the mod developers. There is no guarantee that they will keep working after a major patch such as the upcoming 2.7. In fact, the T-45C developers have stated that they are waiting to test the mod on 2.7 before they release it because there is a chance that the update might break things. I truly believe that a free official trainer would increase sales of actual modules in the long run due to the fact that you have already had a chance to learn how to fly in the sim with a much more friendly aircraft than the Su-25T or the TF-51. But those are only my personal thoughts. CONCLUSIONS I love DCS:World and flight simulators as a whole but I have always wanted to share that experience with more people. It is one of the reasons why I write reviews that take me days to complete, to inform people that might be questioning what aircraft is the best for them. Modules are expensive, after all. It is always better to buy something after you have informed yourself about what you are buying. I wrote the article to throw a bit of light into these two issues that I have noticed ever since I started playing DCS. I hope that it can help in some way, make people discuss about these things. After all: the more people that talk about this, the more likely is something to change. Take care and fly safely. If you want to talk with me about this, feel free to contact me on my discord which is linked on my author bio below. About the author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

After months of waiting, the much awaited 2.7 update for DCS: World finally dropped on April 14th following a couple of delays. The major addition that this update brought are the new cloud and weather systems alongside an almost uncountable amount of fixes and quality of life (QoL) improvements to the sim. We took a couple of days to let the changes sit in just so we could give a better perspective on what our thoughts are as there is a lot to go through. Clouds with a side of new propellers! As seen in the deluge of screenshots that have been taken within the first week, the clouds' visual impact is undeniable. But viewing wonderful pictures is different from experiencing them. From inside and outside the cockpit, they look stunning. With there being 24 presets total, using the Mission Editor is the easiest way to get hands-on. Their wonders and dangers are immediately apparent from flying high above scattered clouds or doing low-level canyon runs in near-zero visibility overcast. Even something as simple as cloud surfing, playfully dipping in and out of them, can cause icing on the aircraft. And this was in a peaceful, free flight setting, clear from the rigors of combat. The only minor problem we found while testing everything is what we called “puffing”. At distance, clouds seem to puff-up into cotton ball-like mass. Here, have a look: Another feature that was added with this patch was a new propeller rendering technology. I won’t go into the details of how it works, but all we need to know is that it accurately calculates the position of each blade to accurately render then in a way that looks natural to the human eye. Here’s how it looks on the TF-51, quite the change! Performance impact, or lack thereof Although very far from being scientific, as there are no built-in benchmarks, we asked several of our friends which had varying levels of hardware. Interestingly, against all of our predictions, performance seems to have had an overall improvement no matter the level. The lowest spec GPU we “tested” on was the GTX 1060 6GB and even that one showed either higher or the same average fps than it did when running DCS 2.5.6.61 at 1080p with mostly the same settings as it had prior to the update. The graphics cards we have at the moment are both a GTX 1660Ti and a RTX 2060, with the first one being Cubeboy’s and the latter Ribbon-Blue’s. Cube’s card showed the same average FPS over Dubai while flying the same route in 10 different runs (~75FPS), while the average FPS at altitude was reduced when compared to 2.5.6 (Ultra clouds, Overcast 3). High preset clouds showed similar results with a noticeable reduction of frames which might indicate that optimization efforts were directed at the Ultra preset for this initial release. Combat impact and thoughts Admittedly, the perception of just how much harder clouds make combat is somewhat skewed for now. With AI units being unaffected by clouds' presence or intensity, these non-player controlled units currently have an advantage against human players. This is a known issue that is already set to be fixed by Eagle Dynamics, but this is a factor for hosts of multiplayer servers that feature AI-controlled units. As mentioned in an earlier article, which mused about the possible impacts of clouds, this temporary unfair advantage may be yet another delay in the employment of clouds by server hosts on their multiplayer servers. After hours of server hopping to get a general feel for the number of servers that immediately enabled the cloud presets, it was a pleasant surprise to see that a majority of the servers our staff visited were using one of the presets. Improved rearming menu The changelog for DCS 2.7 Open Beta is long but distinguished. One of these updates is slightly more detailed information about the weapons and equipment that are loaded onto hardpoints. The refuel/rearm function in the ground crew radio communication menu has often been the cause of quick web searches to confirm a few specifics about them. Things like whether or not they're laser-guided, semi-active radar-guided, capable of bunker penetration, etc. For veterans of this simulator, this information is everyday knowledge. But for those learning new modules or still learning DCS as a whole, the addition of just a few more words in the text box has an impact. Simple tags like "GPS Guided Bomb", "IR ASM" and "Active Rdr AAM" will become a vital part of planning for players. This doesn't replace the need to learn how these weapons operate, but it does prevent accidental weapon-type mixups that could impact a sortie. Get those IFR skills in shape! For the first time in a long time, players might be finding themselves revisiting navigation system tutorials. With so much of DCS' flying being done in VFR-friendly conditions, there wasn't a pressing reason to become an IFR guru. But now depending on whether or not the mission creator decides to throw storm clouds your way, you will need to know how to navigate in the sea of white with your instruments alone. So get practicing! Also, for mission planning in online servers, paying attention to the topography along the ingress, egress, and in the objective area is a slightly higher priority. While information about the exact type of cloud coverage that will be encountered may not be available, knowing the maximum height of the terrain is helpful in avoiding ground collision even in cloud obscured areas. Setting custom warning altitudes in the Horizontal Situation Indicator (HSI) data sublevel could now be just as life-saving as it is in the real world. Conclusions Much like update 1.5 and 2.5, DCS World open beta update 2.7 has changed the simulator in such a way, it almost feels brand new again. Similar sentiments are being expressed by established content creators and players that have flown in DCS for over a decade. A secondary effect update 2.7 has had is a noticeable spike in interest by people that have never heard of DCS before or were on the fence about ever giving it a serious try. This sudden burst of interest coupled with the Sping Sale could result in a new wave of players to further expand the overall player base and eventually populate multiplayer servers even more. After a few more adjustments and minor updates that are bound to happen within the next few weeks, by the time this update reaches the stable build of DCS World, there’s little doubt that 2.7 will go down as one of the pivotal updates within this simulator’s history. About the co-author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034 About the co-author Aaron "Ribbon-Blue" Mendoza The Director of Operations for Skyward Flight Media. A lifelong aviation enthusiast with a special interest in flight simulators and games. After founding Electrosphere.info, the first English Ace Combat database, he has been involved in creating aviation related websites, communities, and events since 2005. He continues to explore past and present flight games and sims with his extensive collection of game consoles and computers. | Twitter | Discord: RibbonBlue#8870 |

After around two years of work, the mod team at Virtual Naval Air Operations (VNAO) have finally released an aircraft that a lot of us in the community were waiting in anticipation ever since it was announced: the T-45C Goshawk, a naval trainer aircraft that every naval aviator will fly at some point in their career. This is not a review but only a first impression look at this mod's initial release (IR) build. The developers are still working on it as I write this article, so it is only natural that things will be improved over time. This article is based on my impressions of v1.0. Additionally, I will treat this mod just by what it is: a mod. It shall not be judged or compared to paid modules. It is a community project made by a group of dedicated modders that made this aircraft with passion. That being said, there will be circumstances where I will need to reference paid modules to make an argument, but it shall not be directly compared to one. With that out of the way, let's take a look at this trainer! EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS This is an area that caught me off-guard, both because of how well executed it is and by the fact that some details seem to have passed through the artists eyes without being seen. The external model is gorgeous from almost every angle. Rivets, panel lines and even smaller details such as exhaust fume burns from the Gas Turbine Starter (GTS) are there! The included liveries are absolutely great, with plenty of details and accurate markings that make these birds feel a bit more believable. Although it is when you start looking at it from certain angles that you can notice that some things are a bit off, particularly with the bump map textures for the wings, the exhaust pipe's model and texture. If it were not for these two details, this model would not have anything to envy from other aircraft in-game. Here are both examples: From my limited experience working with 2D art for 3D models, I would amend this issue by applying a more matte texture to the tail pipe, alongside a normal map that would act as the "substitute" for the detailed engine exhaust, since a new model would add even more tris to an already overly detailed model (~2.000.000 tris). That would make it harder to run on lower-end machines. The normalmap seems to be inverted and it is reflecting light from angles it should not, in addition to the panel lines being too thick. This should be fixable by re-inverting the texture and making the panel lines less thick. Since the developers have already done an excellent job with the external model, I think these solutions should not be outside of their capabilities. Now, one area that they absolutely nailed was the internal model for the cockpit. This is a beauty, no other way to say it. Both the student and instructor cockpits are extremely detailed and very well made. Analog instrument and the Multi-Function Displays (MFD) screens look the part. Lighting is sublime as well, giving you a very nice experience and immersion feel. I do have two very minor complaints, and when I say "minor", I mean it. The first of these is that, while under direct sunlight, the canopy glass' texture seems to be diffusing the sun's light in a very weird way. The second one is that some sunlight seems to go through the frame and illuminate the instruments in scenarios where they should be under full shadow. Here are some examples: This effect is a bit disorienting and I'd suggest that the canopy glass texture should receive an overhaul. I know that some of the textures were still WIP, so I hope this will be tackled in an upcoming update. This effect seems to also affect other aircraft in-game. As far as my knowledge goes, this is a 3D issue. Light is passing through the shell that goes around the 3D model of the cockpit, making it look like the sun is going through the fuselage and straight into the instruments. Again, this is not a deal breaker but something that could receive some attention later on once more important bugs are fixed. FLIGHT MODEL I'll keep this section short and sweet. As long as you fly it within the expected flight envelope you will not find any issues with the flight model. It is a smooth ride from taxi to landing. Stall characteristics are a bit weird sometimes, but it is not a deal breaker. It is an aircraft that requires a lot of trim but that's a good thing, as that is an essential ability that every pilot should know even if they will fly something equipped with a FCS. The behavior on the ground is solid as well, with lock-up mechanics on the nose wheel steering mechanism if it is operated wrongly. The aircraft does feel like it carries some weight to it, both on the ground and in the air. But, what happens when you get it out of its expected/tested flight envelope? I did several test flights the same way that I did when I was testing EFM builds for the A-4E Community mod when they grabbed some of the active testers from their public Discord server as dedicated EFM testers. What do I mean by that? Well, I just tried to fly it like I'd normally would just with the difference of paying really close attention to everything and, whenever I would find a potential flaw, I'd try and track it down. What I experienced was a bit unexpected: I got it to go to Mach 1.4 on level flight, I zoom climbed to 75.000ft and I almost reached Mach 2 on a dive. I know that this is the initial build and that bugs are to be expected, but I was not expecting to get to supersonic speeds or to pull 20G on a corner with no consequence whatsoever. The developers are aware of these issues, and they are working on solving them. I even notified them of the issue with excessive thrust at altitude despite it having been reported before. But this is a first impressions article and I have to be honest with my thoughts. What VNAO has is a great foundation, it reminds me to the first builds I tested of the EFM for the Skyhawk. The A-4E-C devs even had the same issues at first with excessive thrust at high altitudes, causing me to reach Mach 3.31 at some point! I know the devs at VNAO will solve these issues as they have shown they are passionate about this project. MISSION CAPABILITIES This is a pure trainer and that's it. Forget about doing combat missions with this aircraft, if that is what you want you can download other community mods such as the A-4E or the A-29B. The Goshawk's mission is to get rookie pilots to the level where they can feel confident flying more advanced aircraft, like the Hornet, as their time with the Goshawk provided them with all the basic skills they needed. You will be able to do all sorts of training sorties with this bird, though. From basic landing patterns to CASE I and CASE II recoveries on the carrier (due to the lack of ICLS, CASE III practices are not recommended) and basic air to ground and air to air weapon employment. I did some mock dogfights with Hueman, a close friend of mine. I was surprised at the fact that I even managed to get him on my sights a couple of times, calling out simulated kills. This is something I was not expecting. You will be surprised at how useful flying this bird is, even for experienced pilots. It is a much more raw experience than jumping straight into something with a flight computer. Also, this is the ONLY carrier-capable trainer in-game. You are able to be both the pilot and the instructor for a friend thanks to its multi-crew capabilities. This means that you will be able to train your friends or that a veteran friend of yours can be your instructor! Pretty cool and useful. TRAINING ARMAMENT BDU-33 SMOKE BOMBS Perfect for practicing your aim and perfecting your bombing techniques. They are a great companion for this aircraft. They even have their custom bomb rack! M274 SMOKE ROCKETS Useful for practicing different scenarios, marking things for others to see, etc. They are fun to use, like any rocket would be. Give them a try! THE FREE TRAINER THAT DCS NEEDED There is something that I discussed earlier this month, and that was that DCS' newcomer experience is something that needed improvement. The free aircraft that come with the game are not enough to hook some people, making them turn around and leave DCS never to return. I think that what VNAO has done is solve one big piece of that puzzle. This is not only a new free aircraft to DCS, but one that is capable of doing multi-crew training for FREE. As long as the mod is supported and is kept alive, new players will have a chance of getting a taste of a modern DCS aircraft and of getting to train with a friend or even a stranger on an organized training squadron! It might not be an official module nor might it be a perfectly polished mod in its current state, but it delivers in the area that matters the most: training new players. I am really happy that VNAO decided to release this mod publicly as it will help the entire community as a whole. Well done, VNAO! DOWNLOAD THE MOD FROM HERE: OFFICIAL MIRROR 1 (MEDIAFIRE) OFFICIAL MIRROR 2 (UFILE) About the Author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

It was quite surprising to see, that almost out of nowhere, VTOL VR's developer BahamutoD released a new game: Jetborne Racing. This was a very unexpected release; not only because of its timing but because of what it is. This is, to my knowledge, one of the only modern flight games on the market that is solely focused on racing! Initially, I was a bit shocked at the premise. Not because it was strange or anything of the sort, but because it is such a logical game idea that I am in disbelief that no one had done it in recent years. Sure, there are some flight racing games from back in the day, but nothing like this, even less when you consider that it was made with VR in mind. AUDIOVISUAL DESIGN Visually, this game is very similar to VTOL VR if not identical to it. Very simple textures that do not have any kind of embellishments. This has a performance benefit for VR users as the game does not have to load 4K textures with roughness and bump maps, which would need to calculate light reflections on them. This should make sure that the game will run flawlessly on many systems out there. Despite having a minimalistic style, Jetborne has very interesting map designs. From the simple yet elegant wooden tunnels of Mountain pass to the craziness of Moon Base Alpha and the narrow tunnels of Underwater, this game has variety. Take a look at the small gallery bellow so you can see the examples I mentioned. Additionally, the cockpit design is minimalistic. No bells or whistles here, all the information you need is displayed right on the Heads-up Display (HUD) or right bellow it, such as your total and split times. I find this to be beneficial as it makes it easier for you to focus on your flying and what is happening outside of your canopy instead of looking around the cockpit. Audio-wise, the game does have some very good aspects to it. The sound you can hear as you pull Gs and the audio deafening effect as you black/red-out is good. But one area in which I feel there could be some improvement are structural sounds such as the wings swinging back and forth, a louder afterburning sound, etc. In a game that has you constantly pulling over 10Gs I would consider these to be crucially integral to judging your aircraft's attitude while on tight corners. GAMEPLAY Here is where Jetborne shines. It has the same level of polish as VTOL VR, which is one of the best VR experiences out there. It might not have the interactivity and system operations of the former but it does not need them, at all. The flight model is not realistic, but it feels grounded. Taking turns feels exciting and every single time in which I crashed, it was because of my own fault, some exceptions applied. It has been a blast to go through every single circuit, both in single and multiplayer. The best I have to describe it is that it feels like a more realistic Ace Combat-like flight model, don't mind being able to pull 14Gs without consequences. After all, you don't have blood in VR. The best way I have to show you what I mean is with this video I recorded of myself running one of my best personal times in East Bay Loop. I uploaded it to the Skyward Twitter account. Music in the video is courtesy of Cindego (Kubson#1138 in Discord). Very nice stuff all around! Maps feel like they are laid out in such a way that turns flow into one another, but of course there are some maps that are a bit better at this than others. Beginner-level maps are very easy to finish but hard to master. That run I have on the video was a 1:56:858, which is more than a second slower than the world record. It took me a solid day of solely playing this circuit to figure out all the best angles for my level of skill, including the "blind corner" that is the last turn, which leads me to my only complaint. To get the best times on tracks such as Moon Base Alpha or East Bay Loop, you will have to rely on taking corners while blacked out. This means that you will have to memorize the angle of the turn, your bank angle and the number of seconds you will have to keep turning until you can straighten out. While being able to do such a feat is impressive on its own, I can not call it a good game mechanic. Being able to control the aircraft after you black out should not be possible, there should be some kind of penalty for doing so. The rest of the game mechanics are fun. The spectators, which can move from platform to platform, have their own way to affect the race by shooting at the racers. This can be either hilarious or really annoying, at least it was prior to the damage reduction that the spectator guns received. Races with objects, á-la Mario Kart, are really fun as well. FIRST IMPRESSIONS CONCLUSION This is a really, really fun game. It is unique and brings things to the table that no other game has, at least in the last decade or so. It has that VTOL VR polish to it, making it run smoothly on almost any machine. But I do fear for its longevity. Sure, record hunting has been a blast during the release period and it has been exciting to get into a track just to try and get back into the top spots of the leader board. But for how long can that excitement last? How many times can I do a run over and over again on the same map until I get worried. The game has eight maps as of the time of writing, so this feeling only grows more each time I play them. I would recommend this game to any of those who want to race with their friends, VR or not. It is a great game as it is, but I hope that it will get expanded with more maps at some point. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

Over the years I have noticed that there are not that many websites solely dedicated to covering flight games like us at Skyward, and even less that approach them on a journalistic way. One of these would be Stormbirds, a blog ran by ShamrockOneFive! A couple of weeks ago, Stormbirds was celebrating their fifth anniversary. We decided to approach Shamrock in order to talk a bit about how has it been running the blog on his own, his motivations for running it, the experiences he has had along the way, etc. I'd like to thank Shamrock for letting me have this interview with him on such short notice. He made the interview roll smoothly, I appreciate that a lot. Hello and thank you for accepting to have this interview. Can I ask you to introduce yourself? Sure! My name is Colin and I go by ‘ShamrockOneFive’ in most of the sims (and games) that I play. Before we get into talking about the Stormbirds blog, we’d like to learn some more about yourself. How did you end up becoming a flight simulator enthusiast? My interest starts with my lifelong interest in all things that fly. I’m told that I was only a couple of years old when I began pointing at the sky in excitement whenever an aircraft flew over. I went to my first airshow at the age of five and I’ve been fascinated by all aspects of aviation ever since. I have a large collection of books on aviation and history, I enjoy airshow photography, and I love flight simulations as an extension of that interest. In retrospect, not much has changed over the years as I still point excitedly at the sky whenever an aircraft flies over! I think my first flight sim was A-10 Tank Killer by Dynamix but the sim I first fell in love with was Aces of the Pacific by the same studio. I played that sim whenever I had time. From there I played a variety of different flight sims. Aces Over Europe, F-15E Strike Eagle II and III, Fleet Defender, various iterations of Microsoft Flight Simulator, a tiny bit of Lock On: Modern Air Combat and the IL-2 series before jumping into the modern titles. Are there any simulators or flight games in general that are especially important to you? Maybe something you’d suggest to people? Right now, there are four or five sims that I’m focused on writing about and personally enjoying as well. I tend to write about what I am interested in as a starting point, so these are sims that I recommend on a regular basis but also spend a great deal of time enjoying myself. On the civil aviation side, I really enjoy both Microsoft Flight Simulator and X-Plane. Both have their upsides and downsides but the two both offer some compelling experiences on the civil aviation side. Whatever you’re looking for, either one or both of these tiles will have it covered. On the combat flight simulation side of things, IL-2: Great Battles, IL-2: Cliffs of Dover and DCS World are what I’m focused on. The IL-2 series has a long legacy stretching over 20 years and the second and third generations that are still being actively developed are impressive in so many ways. I have spent hundreds if not thousands of hours with all three generations of the series. DCS World is also an extremely impressive and complex sim that is doing incredible things for WWII through to the modern jet age. It’s only in the last 4-5 years that I’ve really gotten into it but I’m glad I did because there’s so much to know. My simulator interest does extend into other genres too. I’ve also been a fan of various racing sims over the years and more recently I’ve developed a bit of a love for Train Sim World as well. Good fun when you’re looking for a very different sim experience. How and when did the concept for the Stormbirds blog come around? Around five years ago I was looking for a new creative outlet and at the same time I was looking for a way to practice my writing skills. In my professional life I am called on to occasionally write news stories for my organization. Sometimes these come up with a very tight timeline. I wanted to be faster at writing and I thought that practicing with something that I’m interested in would help. It did! I’ve also considered multiple times jumping into the video creation side of things rather than doing a blog, but I tend to be the kind of person who likes to run counter to some trends and do my own thing. So, in the age of the YouTube channel content creator, I decided to write a blog. I have, however, put some content together on Stormbirds.blog YouTube channel including starting my own podcast series which now has five episodes. Episode releases come out irregularly as my focus is still very much on the blog and everything tends to relate back to it which is very different than the usual YouTube channel approach. When the blog was created, was it meant to be primarily an IL-2 Sturmovik blog? My content mandate, the thing that drives me to write, is essentially centered around writing about what I want to write about. That sounds a little selfish perhaps, but I think that’s important to do as a content creator. You have to have a passion for whatever it is that you’re writing, otherwise I think the audience will feel the lack of interest. I do feel some responsibility to cover certain subjects that may not be at the top of my interest list, but I do try and stick to my simple mandate most of the time. I always intended to write about multiple sims when I started the blog. When I started it was mostly the IL-2: Great Battles series that I was flying on the regular but it didn’t take too long to expand my coverage to DCS World and on from there. For those that do not know, what is Sturmovikfest? Sturmovikfest is a weeklong celebration of everything IL-2 Sturmovik. It’s only run for two years so far but the festival has offered a variety of serious, competitive, and non-serious events including mass formation flypasts, air racing, and more! When did Sturmovikfest start? How has it changed since the beginning? I started the festival last year. The idea came to me not too long after the pandemic began as I looked to put my energy into something that could be done virtually. With everyone stuck inside, locked away and with so many real-world events cancelled, I thought that it’d be a good idea to try and raise spirits by hosting an event that people could engage with. It proved to be popular enough that we brought it back for this year. I think its future is bright! Have you received any help from IL-2’s developers when it comes to organizing the fest? The festival has certainly had some support from the developers. It has had shout-outs from the developers, the festival thread has been prominently placed on the official forums and I know that the developers have also taken part, quietly, in at least a few of the events. What are the highlights of Sturmovikfest thus far? Many! The community has generated so many ideas over the last two times that we’ve run the event that I can’t wait to see what happens next. From the traditional fly-in event on different servers each night of the festival to the more unique events such as Project R air racing, IL-2 tag, and the Mass Formation event organized by JimTM. That last one, the mass formation, is a unique experience getting pilots together in a non-combat formation pass that has involved a few dozen players at a time. We’ve even had experienced real world aerobatics pilots join us so that has been something special! How do fly-ins work in this event? The concept of the “fly-in” is to say to the community that we’re going to agree to try and fully populate a specific server tonight. Sometimes it’s been a popular server like Combat Box or Finnish Virtual Pilots Dynamic War server and sometimes we go somewhere new that hasn’t seen as many pilots (or tankers) but is just waiting to be experienced. Last year, Finnish Virtual Pilots – Dynamic War server was a relative unknown before the festival and has since become one of the top servers in the community. The fly-in helps provide some visibility for servers that may have not had any yet and at the same time it’s a highly accessible way to participate in the festival by just being there and doing what you’d normally do. During the time you’ve been running the blog, what do you think some of the most substantial releases, updates or news bulletins have been? There’s definitely some big highlights. The release of IL-2: Battle of Kuban was a huge point for the IL-2 series and I had a great time writing both the news in the run up to that launch as well as writing my review of it when it finally released. Another one that sticks firmly in my mind is Heatblur’s release of the DCS: F-14 Tomcat. While the F/A-18C early access release was big for me, the F-14 was just an order of magnitude bigger for the whole sim and my early access first impression review is still a piece that I’m really proud of having wrote. Finally, the reveal of Microsoft Flight Simulator back in June of 2019 was absolutely huge. I had just finished up two fantastic days at FSExpo 2019 in Orlando Florida and was sitting in my hotel room when the news came in. I tapped out an article as fast as I could after I had finished picking my jaw up off the floor. The launch was a big deal too but that initial announcement was momentous and it was when I realized that we were now in a new golden age of flight sims – having seen everything that FSExpo had to offer and learning that so much more was still to come. How do you think running Stormbirds has helped you grow as a writer? It has certainly helped me grow as a writer. It’s let me find my own niche as a writer, improved my “voice” as a writer and it’s broadly improved my overall ability to just sit down, write and get something written down “on paper” so to speak. I used to suffer from a lot of writer’s block, not being sure what to write and then struggling to piece things together. I’m sure it’s not quite as bad as I make it out to be but every essay in university was a painful process. It’s really quite different for me now as I’ve learned to just write and get it out there and then fix it later. I still need to continue to grow as a writer. Some of my regular readers and commenters are extremely helpful at point out when I make a mistake and I appreciate those helpful tips. As much as I pride myself on getting things right and perfect the first time, sometimes I don’t. I’ve gotten better at this in the last five years and I intend to get better over the next five as well. Does having to write articles in a short period of time affect your writing style? It most certainly does. I tried at the outset to keep my time spent on the blog limited to just 30-40 minutes a day at the most. That means writing quickly and sometimes that means abbreviating my style as much as possible. I’ve had many comments from readers that they appreciate the brevity of the articles so obviously that style is helping not just me in managing my time but also the reader. My goal with a lot of the news articles is to get to the point, get to the key facts and provide links to the sources. It’s the synthesis of the news around the flight sim community combined with the breadth of sims that I cover that I think seems to appeal most to my readers – or that’s what I tell myself anyways! I also think it’s important to commentate along the way. This is a blog and I unashamedly inject my own comments into the news as it comes along. It’s obvious that I’m a fan of flight sims. I think they are incredible pieces of software that transcend their programming and become memorable experiences and there’s something really special about that experience that is almost undefinable. I want to project my enthusiasm for that experience into everything that I write. If I wasn’t excited about it, I probably wouldn’t be writing the blog in the first place. How do you manage your releases? Are there any goals or deadlines that you set for yourself? It took me a long time to accept that I’m a goal and deadline driven type-A personality but I have accepted that and so I do aim to produce a fair bit of content according to my own internal goals and deadlines. Being a content creator does always bring with it the risk that you become a slave to your own deadlines and to the audience that you’re trying to appeal to. As much as I like and appreciate my audience, I also have to respect my own well-being and that sometimes means that I’ll do something later when I feel that I want to do it. Striking a balance between those two competing aspects is a challenge and one that I continue to refine. Thank you so much for accepting to have this interview with us. Would you have anything else to add before we conclude? My thanks to both of you for doing this Q&A with me. I’m usually the one doing the interviewing so it’s nice to be on the other side of that and talk about what I do. I’m looking forward to some future possibilities of collaborating between our sites too! Check Stormbirds out if you need a quick fix on the current happenings inside the flight sim world, to check out Shamrock's opinion on a particular matter or just to have a nice read. CHECK STORMBIRDS HERE About the Interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy#9034

If there is one developer that took me by surprise by what they are creating, it would be IndiaFoxtEcho (IFE). From their years of making add-on aircraft for civilian-centric simulators, I would have never expected them to venture into DCS World. I had the pleasure to talk, yet again, with my friend Giuseppe. Better known as Duke, he was responsible for coding the EFM for the MB-339PAN mod. Nowadays, he works as a coder for IFE helping to create plenty of amazing aircraft for a variety of simulators. We last spoke with Duke when we covered the Frecce Tricolori Virtuali and its endeavors; today we will have another talk with him about everything IFE is up to. From some personal questions, to the DCS MB-339A and some exclusive details on the recently announced DCS Fiat G.91! First of all, thank you so much for accepting to have an interview with us. Could you please start by introducing yourself? My name is Giuseppe, also known as Duke in the Flight Sim community. I’m an aerospace engineer, aviation enthusiast with a great passion for flight simulations. My adventure in DCS modelling started with the Frecce Tricolori Virtuali development team as an EFM coder for the popular free mod MB-339PAN. Today, the rest of FTV development team and I have joined the IndiaFoxtEcho team. For how long have you been a part of IndiaFoxtEcho? How has the experience been so far? Our team has always been in excellent relations with Dino Cattaneo of IndiaFoxtEcho, but only in the first half of 2020 we have increasingly begun to talk about a possible collaboration that has materialized during the summer of 2020. This has allowed us to have a contract with Eagle Dynamics and to become official 3rd party developers. How has the transition from being a modder to a full-time developer been? Any differences in the way you approach module development? Honestly, the only thing changed is having a direct communication channel with ED specialists allows us to get information sooner than reverse engineering from other modules. From the workload side, everything is like before. We all have a primary job and aircraft development started as a hobby and today becomes a second activity for us. Tackling both Microsoft Flight Simulator and DCS at the same time is no easy task. How big is the team at IFE and what does each member of the team do? IndiaFoxtEcho development team is composed of 10 people active mainly on DCS projects. Some of them are also involved in MSFS development which requires a less amount of time to develop a new aircraft thanks to a good SDK base and to the fact that the majority of systems and flight dynamics are precompiled and available to developers for customization. The team also includes several external contributors and internal testers which helps us to test new functionalities and support us making other features for our modules. The MB-339 mod for DCS, which is now unsupported, was one of the best community mods in the eyes of many including myself. Now that it is being remade and improved as an official module, which do you think are the key differences between the mod and the module? Gallery of the new 3D cockpit assets and textures made for the MB-339 (WIP build) The new MB-339 will be totally different from the free mod. First, the 3D models (internal and external) have been totally revised. Geometry has been improved thanks to several surveys on real aircraft, such as textures that now look real providing a more immersive simulation experience. Also systems have been redone: now the aircraft has an electric system with five separated bus bars including working circuit breakers, main and emergency hydraulic systems, full working pressurization and oxygen systems and more. Finally, the module includes also a complete navigation system composed by GPS, TACAN, VOR/ILS and Flight Director. All the on board systems are linked to the damage model which is also compliant with real aircraft limitations. Have you been working with any subject matter expert (SME) to get the MB-339’s flight model as close to reality as possible? The EFM of the free mod was developed with the support of real pilots and instructors of MB-339 which provided us precious feedback for creating a flight model as close to the real aircraft’s performance. For this reason, we focused our efforts to develop a more detailed aircraft in terms of systems and weapons. For future projects, we started a cooperation with DIMEAS – Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering of Polytechnic University of Turin to create better flight dynamics with a specific focus on flight control systems simulation. DCS, at the moment, lacks a trainer aircraft with air to air refueling capabilities. Since some variants of the MB-339 do have refueling probes, will any of them be included at some point in the project? Yes, it would be nice to have a more advanced trainer with AAR capabilities but the DCS MB-339 will be a fidelity reproduction of the A variant used by the majority of Air Forces of the rest of the world. From what I have seen, the official MB-339 will carry more specialized weaponry than the mod did. Which of these weapons do you think will stand out as a unique inclusion to DCS? We have worked hard to develop new weapons such as the BAP-100, BAT-120 and Durandal bombs. These weapons have been passed to ED which kindly supported us for integrating them in DCS Core so they will be available also for other modules which are supposed to carry them. We also included several weapons for training but they are Italian Air Force exclusive like Aerea Dispenser BRD-4-250. How is the new DCS damage model being implemented in the MB-339? Any highlights? Currently, the new Damage Model is available only for WWII aircraft. For our MB-339 we used the classic one but we have been careful to model the damage by putting virtually every single piece of equipment in the real position on board the aircraft in order to recreate the related failure depending on where the plane is hit. (Here is a document that IFE made about the DCS MB-339 damage model) Have you encountered any setbacks while developing the MB-339 that may have delayed its release? How has the team handled such challenges? One of the main things was rewriting the code. Until the ED contract, we wrote the MB-339 code without SDK support so we had to write from scratch the entire DCS interface. This took some development time which delayed the release of the module. However, the delays weren't so bad and within a couple of months we picked up where we left off. Without getting into any specific dates, how close would you think the MB-339 is from release At this date, the MB-339 is at 90% of its development. We could release it at a “early access” state but we prefer to provide a full module considering that currently the free mod is still available (even with some issues due to DCS 2.7 release). We are confident to release it within the end of 2021. I saw a very interesting picture in your social media, the teaser picture for a Fiat G.91. Is there anything you can share with us about that project? (i.e aircraft variants, weaponry, etc.) The G.91 started as a toy project in cooperation with some Sim Skunk Works members when we were modders. Today, as part of IndiaFoxtEcho, we have discussed several projects to be developed in future for DCS World and the G.91 was an obvious choice thanks to the availability of official documentation (we have access to the historical archive of the old FIAT-Aeritalia) and the access to several aircraft in good state for surveys (for your information, next year in Italy for the 100th anniversary of Italian Air Force, a G.91R-1B will back in flight). Several versions of the aircraft are similar enough so we planned to develop the PAN (aerobatic version of Frecce Tricolori), R-1B (Italian Air Force version) and R-3 (Luftwaffe version). We are also considering making an R-4 but we will see in future… probably this version will come later as bonus aircraft but this is not confirmed yet. As for the weaponry, our goal is to add all G.91R weapons reported in the flight manual such as the AS-20 Nord missile and AIM-9B. Speaking of these two weapons, for the record, the AS-20 was not used by any air force equipped with G-91s due to its costs (only FIAT-Aeritalia performed some tests to shooting range for weapon qualification) whilst the AIM-9B integration was a total fail during tests of Portuguese Air Force (the IR sensor of the missile never locked the target so the integration was abandoned). Aside from the two confirmed modules for DCS, are there any plans to bring some other aircraft to the simulator? Particularly, are there any plans to bring the M-346 to DCS at some point after the two ongoing projects are complete? Unfortunately we cannot discuss further projects, but I can say that other news will come as soon as the MB-339 is released. Once again, thank you so much for accepting our interview request. Would you want to add anything else before we conclude our interview? Many thanks to you for your interest in our projects, we are glad to have had this interview and we hope to have the opportunity, in future, to discuss our next steps on DCS World in greater detail. We'd like to take the opportunity of this interview to thank all our followers and our supporters. We are a small team with a great enthusiasm and we hope not to disappoint your expectations. About the Interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy#9034

As a follow-up to our review of this spectacular community creation, we got in contact with JNelson to ask him a series of questions about some of the experiences he had while developing the External Flight Model (EFM) for the Skyhawk alongside Farlander. We hope this interview brings some insight into what goes into making an EFM for DCS, the discoveries that were made along the way that enabled some of the best additions for v2.0 of the Scooter. We'd like to thank JNelson and the entire A-4E dev team for allowing us to have this interview and for their work on this mod. Q: Hello! We really appreciate that you are taking your time to have this interview with us. Could you please start by introducing yourself? A: Hello I’m JNelson, one of the A-4E Community Developers. I wrote the EFM for the A-4E with Farlander. I also have programmed many requested features, a few being the CP-741/A bombing computer, radio, new Tacan and ICLS. Q: How did you get into DCS? Have you done/been a part of any other projects prior to the Skyhawk? A: I’ve been playing DCS since late 2012. I picked up the A-10C on steam for £7 back then and since then I’ve been hooked and now have several thousands of hours flying in DCS. The A-4E was my first DCS related project. Q: What brought you and Farlander to the A-4E project? Did you have any previous experience with coding an EFM or was this your first time? A: Farlander had worked with the team before to produce some 3d assets in the past, so I knew about the project. We both love the A-4E however we both absolutely hate simple flight models and thought the A-4E being SFM was a tremendous waste of potential. So rather than complaining about it we both looked into it. This was the first time for both of us creating an EFM, however I have a degree in Physics and Farlander is studying to be an Engineer, that combined with our experience in DCS and general interest in aerodynamics certainly gave us a foundation to learn the principles we needed for a detailed and realistic EFM. Q: Which was the first step you took to create the EFM? Data gathering or did you start by researching how things work inside of the DCS framework? A: The DCS framework is really quite straightforward. It’s essentially an interface into the DCS physics engine. The first issue was we did not have a good collection of equations to implement a basic flight model. We tried to make a basic example back in October 2019 this worked but was pretty garbage. In May 2020 Farlander found a book called Principles of Flight Simulation by David Allerton. This had everything we needed to get going. The first step after gaining this information was to get a minimal working example which we could expand on. The night Farlander found this book I told him by tomorrow I’ll have a working EFM. All night later I had a very garbage but functioning EFM. There were all kinds of problems with this initial model but it was a base from which to improve. From here we gathered as much NASA data as possible. To replace the placeholder values I had used for the first version. Q: Which parts of the EFM were the hardest to code? (stall characteristics, engine simulation, system simulation, etc). A: Not necessarily the hardest thing to code but the thing we ran into the most problems with were conversions between the wind axis and the body axis. This was compounded when we went to an element based model as alpha and beta had to be calculated for each element. A good set of tests would have prevented a lot of this pain but we were doing this in our spare time and who wants to write tests. Other than that I don’t think anything was particularly difficult to implement, the primary difficulty for most things is getting the first working example to be improved. Q: How hard was it to code the EFM while not having access to the SDK? Are there still things that cannot be added due to not having access to it? A: This is generally a common misconception out in the community. There are very few things (if any) that stop a fully realistic implementation of an EFM. There of course limitations for systems and interactions with the DCS world however something like the A-4E can almost all be accurately simulated with the current interface we have available to us. One thing I would love ED to add would be the ability to write our own hook physics similar to the Tomcat and F/A-18. Q: When it comes to systems the way they interact with the SFM, which ones had to be rewritten in order to make them work with the EFM? Probably the most time consuming thing from my perspective for the early part of the project was integrating the EFM to the existing lua. A lot of the sensors and data no longer existed and had to be replaced with values from the EFM. There are other things which were completely broken and needed complete replacement, a couple of examples would be the AFCS and radio. When these were re-written we took the opportunity to make sure these systems were as close to real life as possible. There were other systems which had to be ripped out for the system to be functional. An example of this was all the carrier work-around script. The work-around had interesting things like an invisible afterburner to get the A-4E to launch off the deck, but this had unforeseen things like the throttle being routed through the carrier script so the player couldn’t engage this afterburner. This all had to be removed and replaced with the official DCS interface for the carrier. Q: One of the most impressive additions to the A-4E that came with the EFM was the addition of functional radios and TACAN/ILS/ICLS navigation. What was the process of developing these like? Any hurdles that you had to get through along the way? A: These changes fall into two categories. The radio and the radio navigation. Radio The process itself is really just a case of browsing the memory for known values and trying to tie that back to things to which you have access. I spent weeks without getting anywhere. Once you have memory addresses of important objects you can then easily call their functions (without getting too technical is not always straightforward since some are virtual). It is easy to see what functions and objects are possible to interact with by looking at the relevant DLL’s. This information is available to anyone who simply dumps these functions. The issue is that the exact makeup of the structures used is not known. This would normally be given in a file (header file) with the SDK which of course we do not have. So this has to be worked out by monitoring the memory. I eventually found a method for reliably getting the position in memory for any lua device using the lua. The final step was figuring out functions which needed to be called to enable the radio. TheRealHarold had already figured this out and shared this information with us. Combining this with my method for getting the positions in memory allowed us to get the radio working reliably. There was only one remaining thing to be sorted which was to get the radio menu to come up during flight and this was just simply calling one of the functions relating to the intercom with the memory address for the intercom. Radio Navigation The primary issue to solve is the position and heading of the beacon you are trying to track. There is no interface for getting this information in DCS. There are avTACAN devices you can try and create however these fail to be initialised so you cannot use the same method as the radio. The avILS device can be reverse engineered in a similar way to the radio, I did get this working however this is of no use because it only works for land based ILS without some unknown and likely time consuming (to reverse engineer) changes. The static land based ILS and TACAN were already covered since we can retrieve the map beacon data. This is how the initial TACAN and ILS were implemented. There was no implementation for the ILS yet so I implemented this. These aren’t too complicated since it’s just basic geometry Video of AA TACAN working. Video source: JNelson. The position and heading of the beacons for moving objects, ships, aircraft and portable tacan units was the big problem to solve. After a long time investigating all kinds of avenues. I found a way (which I won’t go into for security reasons) to essentially get the memory address of an object based on it’s ID in the mission file. This is useful because the vehicles in the mission file have their TACAN and ICLS channels, so I can essentially correlate a mission ID to a real object in game. Once you have that object you just need to find the location of the positional and rotational data which is just some offset from the address of the object. This is easy enough to do by just comparing the values in the memory to the position in game. Since this is essentially a hack we haven’t released the source code for this. Although ED are welcome to get in touch if they want to find out how exactly I did it. Q: The A-4E, as of now, is one of the only if not the only community made mod capable of doing air to air refueling. Which discoveries made this possible? Was it a complex feature to add? A: The DCS API supported this already for any EFM’s the issue was getting in contact with the tanker which required the radios to be reverse engineered. Once that was reverse engineered it worked like a charm. Q: Getting an EFM to behave accordingly is quite the challenge but with the Skyhawk, flight characteristics seem to be on-point according to NATOPS. Did you have any help from a Subject Matter Expert (SME) at any point during the development? Very early carrier tests (Not everything is smooth sailing, but at least you get cool videos) Video source: JNelson A: We mostly used NASA wind-tunnel data for the EFM. However the transient data was not as accurate so a lot of this was augmented by help from our SME (A-4M pilot). We also had a few excellent testers which found discrepancies for us to fix. This sped up the development and was incredibly helpful. Q: How complex is the code behind the flight dynamics in terms of simulation? Any highlights you would have that you think are cool and worth mentioning? A: As stated before we used NASA wind-tunnel data for the EFM. Farlander spent a long time splitting the wings and surfaces into elements, this provides a more dynamic simulation of the wing. It’s not completely accurate since these elements are completely independent but it provides a good approximation. The other cool thing are the physically realistic slats, modeled physically and deployed based on their aerodynamics. Q: How many hours do you think you have spent coding the EFM as a whole? A: At least more than a thousand hours between Farlander and myself. Q: The A-4E had public tester events that members of the mod’s Discord could request access to. What was some of the most beneficial data learned through these events? A: The primary reason for these events were to pick up difficult to detect bugs. There were some very interesting bugs that were found and fixed as a result of these. Q: Version 2.0 is going to be a big release for the project. Are there any additions that are going to be made after 2.0? How will the mod be supported after the launch? A: The radar has been re-written for v2.1 to greatly improve performance and resolution. Making the radar much more useful for IFR and regular navigation. The JATO is also being modeled and simulated for v2.1 which will make shortfields much more possible and exciting. Early look at v2.1 radar improvements. Notice the radar shadows being cast from the terrain. Video source: JNelson Thank you so much for taking the time to answer these questions. We really appreciate it and we wish that these answers help to clarify any of doubts some of the users might have had about the complexity of the development of an EFM for DCS World. Our review of this community module can be found HERE, check it out! About the Interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy#9034

I have been playing Il-2 Great Battles for the last year or so and I have been loving this flight simulator to bits. It is engaging and offers a set of scenarios and a roster of aircraft that you just cannot find anywhere else. But I had yet to try one major aspect of this sim, that being its compatibility with VR headsets! VR flying is always awesome, no matter the platform. IL-2 is one such experience, but let's take a bit more of a detailed look at how it compares to flying with a head-tracker and at how the developers adapted this desktop-first simulator into VR! THE GOOD: AN EXCELLENT AND OPTIMIZED FLIGHT EXPERIENCE To be completely honest, I am not the biggest VR user out there. I mostly play games with a couple of close friends and fly around in DCS: World to relax after a long day. That being said, I have noticed a couple of things that have made my VR flying experience a bit unpleasant, the main one being the performance and optimization of VR titles. My specs are not the greatest, falling on the lower-mid tier for modern hardware but there is a reason why VR titles have the reputation of being performance hogs. So you can imagine how surprised I was when IL-2 ran smoothly without any major adjustments. I did not even have to run the textures and reflections to low or decrease my draw distance by that much! Cockpit models transfer excellently to VR, with proper scaling. It is hard to describe how something like this looks in VR without being in VR, but all I can say is that the models are stunning and I wish that some other games could look this good while also running as smoothly as this does. Seeing your enemies go down, the effects of G-LOC (G-Induced Loss of Consciousness), the breath of your pilot as they struggle to stay focused and awake while maneuvering. These are the aspects that make this experience worth it. To demonstrate a bit of how it would look, I recorded one of my first dogfights. There were some recording issues that caused hiccups here and there. But you should get an idea of how much freedom of movement VR has when following a target around. Take a look! My PC Specs: Ryzen 5 3600 Stock. 16GB DDR4 @3200MHz GTX 1660Ti w/6GB GDDR6 Overclocked @2055Mhz 1TB NVME SSD Oculus Rift S THE NOT SO GOOD BUT STILL ALRIGHT: USER INTERFACE AND MENU INTERACTIONS Everything good has to have some flaws and IL-2's VR implementation is no exception. Although these are mainly minor complaints, I sincerely think that they should be addressed at some point on one way or another. My main complaint would be that there is no way to interact with the menus from inside of VR by using VR controllers. The only way to interact with any kind of menu is by blindly reaching out to your mouse and clicking your problems away. Is this something you can get used to? Yes, in fact. I have already gotten used to it. Should this stay like this? I hope it does not. There is a reason why many games, including ones that do not have their focus on clickable elements, have the option to use your VR controllers to navigate. Aside from that, my only other complaint would be that you cannot have separate settings for VR and Desktop, forcing you to always reset your settings by hand each time you switch between modes. DCS World does have this feature, allowing you to save up to three user presets which you can switch to without much hassle. This is useful for those who switch between Desktop and VR, people like me. In conclusion: If I am complaining about petty features like this, you know that this is one hell of a solid VR experience. I love it. If you have this sim and a VR headset, give it a go. You won't regret it! About the Author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy#9034

After some years of development and a couple of set backs, one of the most expected WW2 modules for DCS is finally here. The de Havilland Mosquito is one of most impressive aircraft that Britain built during the war, so having the possibility to enjoy it as a full fidelity module is fantastic. To say that I like this aircraft would be an understatement, seeing as I have a scale model of it right under my monitor as I write this, of the same variant too! Let us take a look at what this highly anticipated module has to offer at launch and how this Early Access launch stacks in relation to previous releases such as the P-47 Thunderbolt. EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL MODELS She has, without question, one of the most complex and intricately-made models currently in the game. The shapes for the external model might be simple but they are polished and to the average user it looks perfect (This is not considering some of the things I have noticed when looking at it as a "2D artist" such as the stretched UVs) . From the subtle curves of the main wooden fuselage that lack rivets to the impressively detailed bomb bay, this model is pretty. Click the pictures to enlarge them The cockpit is not slacker either. It has been beautifully recreated and excellently weathered. All the knobs and crevices look like they have been used but not like they have been beaten with a bat, a nice balance indeed. Both the pilot and navigator sides are gorgeous, even more when you the back side of the navigator side and its equipment. If the release delay was because of the remodeling process, then it is certain that it was worth the wait. Scroll through the pictures! FLIGHT AND SYSTEM MODELING I have the very respectable amount of zero flight hours on real life Mosquitos, so take my opinion here with a Texas-sized grain of salt. Without axis curves, this aircraft feels a bit overly sensitive. That is something I also experienced with all other WW2 aircraft that I tried, so I have gotten used to tweaking my desk-mounted short stick (T1.6000 and TWS Throttle w/pedals) to these modules. From what I have heard, these modules are modeled to reflect the longer control columns that these fighters had. To fix that "oversensitivity", lower your saturation and add a slight curve. That should do the trick. But when you have tuned her well, oh boy, she is a joy to fly. She is maneuverable but not as much as a Spitfire or even a P-47D. She is fast and, when using all of her advantages, she can annihilate almost every fighter. Remember that you are heavy but extremely fast for your size, so use that to your advantage. I can't really complaint about the systems since I have not had the time to use them to their fullest, so I will reserve my comment on this subject for a future full review once it is out of Early Access. Oh, one noteworthy thing about the engine modeling is that the developers modeled the infamous carburetor issues that can cause engine stalls during negative G maneuvers. Watch out for this, since you will most likely be in this situation (like I've been countless times). ARMAMENT At launch, this bird came only with a fraction of the weaponry it should have. But remember, this is an Early Access launch inside of the Open Beta branch. This means that features will be added as they are developed. .303 BROWNING MACHINE GUNS (4X) Kind of weak but their sheer volume of fire is enough to deal damage. You have 4 of these with plenty of ammo to spray and pray. HISPANO 20MM CANNONS (4X) Now these actually deal some significant damage. Not as much ammo as the MGs but plenty to last a while, watch that trigger time though! 250 and 500LB BOMBS The only externally mounted armament in the Early Access release. These are enough to do a single pass on a target and the scram towards allied airspace. CONCLUSION So, after talking about this bird, what are my thoughts on it? Simple, this bird feels right at home in DCS. It is a welcome addition to the WW2 roster and I can not wait to see how the developers will handle the Early Access period. This was a great module launch. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

DCS, lately, has been an interesting simulator to enjoy. Between the multiple modules that are due to arrive sooner rather than later, the mod team that I am now a part of and the vast amounts of modules I have yet to explore; it has been a bit difficult for me to find the same type of enjoyment in DCS as I did when I first tried it out so many years ago. To be honest, it is not that I do not enjoy my time flying. Quite the opposite, I enjoy it now more than I have ever done. But, as time has passed, the types of activities I do to enjoy my time in this extremely vast game have changed a lot. At the start, I flew DCS like I flew all my other flight sims: like a hermit. I sat down and the only thing I ever did was do single player missions. Those, alongside campaigns, kept me mostly satisfied for a while. Until it got stale. That is when my luck came to the rescue. It was about that time that my best bud, "Ribbon-Blue", decided to also get into DCS. He also introduced me another one of his friends, now my friend, "Kosmos". Some others that got into DCS around the this time were "Prov", alongside "Hueman". We started flying more regularly, and some of my other friends (like "Raptor86") slowly starting drifting towards organizing flight nights where we do semi-organized combat sorties. I found more fun and excitement in those early multiplayer sessions than in all my single player sessions combined. Yet the reasons behind my enjoyment might not be clear. Anything is better with friends, of course, but there is more to it. The same stale missions that I used to play became more random with more players involved, which led to situations in which I have never would have been involved if I was flying by myself. Everything became more dynamic and two things became clear to me: First, DCS is currently best experienced by having a group of close friends to enjoy it with, hell, even flying with randoms can be extremely entertaining. Not only due to the fact that flying together is great but also due to the fact that you can discover and learn new airframes and ways to use those airframes together! That is an experience unique to DCS and some other flight sims but one that is rare on other sides of the gaming community. Second, DCS is dependent on multiplayer and community to be truly enjoyed, something that is a double edge sword. I'll explain why. With community comes great potential for future growth and additionally, potential for community-made creations that can elevate the experience even more. Just look at mods such as the A-4E, C-130J and MB-339. All of those are community-made creations made by passionate individuals that have changed the way I look at DCS, an impressive achievement! But what happens if the player plays the game like I did, as a single player title? Other sims such as Falcon BMS and IL-2 Great Battles have alternatives for them, while also having rich multiplayer communities. DCS, currently, is lacking on single player features. The main feature that is missing is the dynamic mission or campaign generator, instant mission aside. We know that Eagle Dynamics is working on it and I hope it will turn out to be a great tool for all of us to use, but its absence is more noticeable to me more now than ever before. To give some context: I have been extremely busy with several projects (and so have some of my friends), including being the sole (for now) texture artist for the DCS UH-60L Blackhawk project. My time for extremely long DCS sessions is no longer there and even when I have sessions with my buddies, which I always enjoy greatly, my lack of energy has made me prone to exhaustion. This is why I have delved into shorter single player flights to clear my head. In those flights is when I started to think to myself: "hey, I could be playing a 30 min flight on a dynamic campaign in Falcon" or "Man, I wish DCS had some other way to play on my own". I realized that I had become dependent on DCS' multiplayer to even enjoy DCS. I just hope that, as I manage my time, I start finding time to fly more with my buddies. But for the time being I think that, aside from the Blackhawk and the occasional session with my friends, my enjoyment of DCS World will not be the same as it was with multiplayer. That dynamic campaign generator can not arrive soon enough, I am counting on you ED! About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer, content manager and the co-founder of Skyward Flight Media ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

It has been a while since we last talked about Desert Wings, hasn't it? We really liked what we saw back when this expansion launched in August 2020. But that does not mean we have not revisited the title on the time since then. Quite the opposite, we have kept our eye on the developers and the game as it continues its journey. To say that the guys over at Team Fusion Simulations have been busy would be an understatement. They have kept updating the game at a constant pace, including many quality of life improvements to the core of the game. This is something that I wish more developers did and it shows how committed this team is to their project. Aside from these QoL improvements, the developers have been actively working on more content such as a number of campaigns but, additionally, they have worked on two aspects that could turn this game from a game I casually play to one of my primary flight simulators. These are still in development but these are the two main fields they have been working on: AN EXTREME VISUAL OVERHAUL I don't tend to use the word extreme very lightly, when I say extreme I mean extreme. They have been retexturing the external models of aircraft and upscaling their resolution all the way to 4K (4096 x 4096). That would put these textures on-par with contemporary simulators such as DCS:World or even CLoD's successor, IL-2 Great Battles. It is hard to put into perspective the effort that goes into retexturing but ever since I started working on the DCS: Blackhawk project, I have learned to understand how time consuming a process like this can be. But believe me when I say this is worth it. Here are a couple of my favorite picks from the images that TFS have been sharing of their retextured models, take a look: They have not only worked on textures, though. They have also been working on the implementation of TrueSky, a fact that surprised me since this is the same tech being used on games like Ace Combat 7 and Project Wingman, just to name a few. This means that the sky will get a lot prettier as this new tech allows for volumetric clouds and weather to go with them! You can see them in action on the above screenshot but here is one where the scale of this change is truly appreciable. I expect this game will get a lot more enticing for new players as these cosmetic changes to work like make up for this old title, taking it to the current generation of flight sims. But speaking of current flight sim tech, let's talk about the other feature that the developers have been working on. VIRTUAL REALITY INTEGRATION Yup. This old game is now getting VR compatibility, making good on the promise that the developers did when they launched Desert Wings. Not that much is known about the VR implementation aside from a couple of posts and a recent video by the developers but what has been shown looks very promising. As someone that is quite new to VR, I am excited to try it out and see everything for myself. What also helps VR to be much more appealing now rather than before are all of those cosmetic changes we discussed previously. Those will be the cherry on the cake for this title, finally putting it at the same level as all my other simulators. Check the official informational video that the devs made about their VR implementation: I sincerely applaud the developers for not only proceeding to develop all of these aspects into their simulator but also for the fact that this will be a free update for all owners of the game. From modders to proper developers, the folks at Team Fusion Simulations never cease to amaze me with their level of dedication and passion towards this lovely simulator. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as the co-founder, content director and writer for Skyward Flight Media ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

There are only a couple of games that such an emphasis on combined arms like Arma does. And out of those, only Arma has such an extensive modding scene that allows this experience to be taken to the absolute extreme. Today, I wanted to talk about RHS' Apache mod and how it has allowed me to practice multicrew for the upcoming AH-64D module in DCS World. It might not be clickable nor very in-depth when it comes to managing its systems, as it is usual for most aircraft in Arma, but it has a balance of realism and arcade mechanics that lends itself well to the combat environment that it will fight in. With that being said, let's start! A GAME WHERE CLOSE AIR SUPPORT MATTERS Aside from being an infantry focused FPS, Arma has always had a focus on combined arms combat. To the point where it has become a staple of the franchise. The Apache is, for a lack of a better term, the ideal Close Air Support (CAS) support aircraft for a game such as this. Maps are smaller than one would think and they can be flown over by aircraft in a blink of an eye. While something like an A-10C would do wonderfully as CAS if the maps where smaller, the slower speeds and operational flexibility it offers make it better suited to the smaller map sizes of Arma. To understand this a bit more, put yourself in this situation: You have just been ambushed on a road by four APCs and a lot of infantry, you and your squad have called in CAS to support your advance. What would you rather have as support? 1. An A-10C which could take a minute or so in-between passes as it clears the area because, if it linger for too long, it might get shot down by an Igla. It's passes are deadly but it can only fire a Maverick and a short burst of 30mm with each pass. 2. An Apache that can stay closer to you and your squad while also being able to provide almost constant air cover for your guys. It stays behind a hill or at stand-of range, raining radar-guided Hellfires into the enemy vehicles, and once the armor is out of action it can fly close and obliterate the enemy infantry with non-stop 30mm cannon fire. I would, personally, like to have an Apache cover me in this specific situation. An A-10C would probably be able to provide great cover too, but I love having the aircraft covering me be closer to the action. This is exclusive to Arma, though, so please do remember that everything I talk here is only about how me and my group have operated the Apache over fixed wing aircraft as of late. THE KING OF CLOSE AIR SUPPORT For me and my group of friends, the Apache has been our primary CAS aircraft. Not only have we used it to defend our base from attack but we have also used it to attack enemy outposts and to provide support for allied armor assaults. It has been quite the workhorse! Even inside of Arma, this whirly bird has quite the arsenal (these are specifically talking about RHS' Apache): INTEGRATED HELMET AND DISPLAY SIGHTING SYSTEM The IHADSS is an extremely useful piece of kit. It offers navigational and targeting displays for both pilot and gunner, making it essential for combat even on a game like Arma. You are able to slew this puppy to the M230 cannon and to most of your sensor suite. Just aim and shoot! M230 CHAIN GUN Being able to choose your burst length is a godsend. It allows the gunner to put accurate fire exactly where it's needed and for no longer than it's necessary. You are able to use the gun both with the camera and with the Integrated Helmet and Display Sighting System (IHADSS). Just look at what you want dead and press the trigger, pretty neat! 70MM HYDRA ROCKETS ON M261 PODS Although they lack the moving pylons, these are still extremely effective for area denial. You have 19 Hydras on each pod. AGM-114 HELLFIRE MISSILES Tired of that pesky APC that is bothering your troops below? That is what these are for. You have two variants. A laser-guided one (AGM-114L) and a radar-guided one (AGM-114K). These are extremely deadly and accurate, and a lot of fun. But there is something deadlier than an Apache, an Apache with a coordinated crew. MULTICREW PRACTICE FOR DCS' APACHE For quite a while, I've flown with Kosmos. He is good friend of mine and someone with who I have always had good chemistry, primarily when it comes down to working together as a team on games and such. But I have always said that the place where we both fit perfectly with each other is as a helicopter crew, specifically, as an Apache crew in Arma. He's a pretty decent pilot in Arma and DCS, so he has no issues keeping the bird steady for me to work the gun and Hellfires from the front. We help each other, giving pointers and directions as to where targets are using our sensors. This usually has some awesome results, We usually use terrain masking and take advantage of the ability the JTACs have, which is to lase for us. There is something specially satisfying about using laser-guided Hellfires from behind a hill on Lock-on After Launch (LOAL) Hi mode. You just see this missile go upwards and then behind the hill where RibbonBlue, which is usually our JTAC, has his laser on an APC or any other piece of armor. Then you hear confirmation of a hit from Blue, that's always exciting. It is that kind of teamwork and multicrew performance that makes me really excited about putting all this practice I have into "the real deal" whenever DCS's Apache comes out, which should be sooner rather than later. And I really, really am looking forward to flying with Kosmos in DCS. I am sure we'll be as good of a team there as we are here. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as the co-founder, content director and writer for Skyward Flight Media ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

This idea has been in my backburner for a while now. I started making liveries for DCS:World in 2019 when I finally got my hands on a PC that could run it, but I have been creating liveries for different flight simulators for the past decade or so. And as time passes, I have realized that I have not really seen many tutorials or detailed guides on this aspect of games and that most of what I know has come from teaching myself how to do things from experimenting. In this guide, I will try and teach you everything that you might need to get started with livery/skin creation for flight simulators but more specifically for DCS: World. I will provide you with tools, explain basic concepts and guide you through the creation of a complete livery for the Community A-29B Super Tucano mod. Let's get started! THIS IS VERSION 2 OF THIS GUIDE: -ADDED MODELVIEWER2 TUTORIAL AND SETUP SECTION. STEP 1: BASIC CONCEPTS AND NECESSARY SOFTWARE To start, I would like to explain what a "texture" is and how it interacts with the model of the plane we are going to texture, in our case, the Super Tucano. This also applies to any other 3D model you might encounter out there. A texture is nothing more than an image consisting of pixels (a bitmap) that carries color or some other information (such as reflectivity, bumpiness, etc.) in which a 3D model is unwrapped over. Usually, this unwrapping process is done by the 3D artist while creating the model. The best way to visualize this would be with an example most of us are familiar with: A candy/chocolate bar! To the left, the "textured model" To the right, the "unwrapped" texture for model. See how the 2D plastic wrapper (right) bends to form the complete wrap (left)? That is essentially what a texture is. The chocolate, in this case, would be the untextured 3D model; hence why textures are sometimes referred to as "skins" that envelop this model. Now that we all understand what a texture is, let's start creating one by downloading an image manipulation software of any kind. This will be our main tool to work with textures as well as with any other images we wish to edit for it. I will recommend two for our use case: GNU IMAGE MANIPULATION SOFTWARE (GIMP) Free and open source, this is the best alternative to Photoshop available at the moment. It has all the tools we might need for texture creation with one particular exception: It's lack of options for DDS compression. I will explain what DDS is in the next part of this article, but let's just say that it is important. Aside from that, GIMP is an excellent platform with a very friendly and intuitive UI that resembles that of some Photoshop versions. This is, in my honest opinion, the ideal tool for those who do not want to pay for Adobe software. This will be the software we will use throughout this tutorial with only one exception which you will see in the guide. PAINT.NET Utilizing the .NET framework, this image manipulation software is also sufficiently useful for what it offers. Despite having a less intuitive UI, it has almost complete feature parity with GIMP and surpasses it in some very specific aspects. We will use it for a single aspect of our creation but feel free to use it for all your livery creation needs. Just know that most examples throughout this guide will be depicted with GIMP. Now that we understand what a texture is and we have the software we will need, let's get started! STEP 2: KNOWING YOUR SOFTWARE, WORK ON THE BASE TEXTURE AND INITIAL TESTING STEP 2.1: For the purpose of this tutorial, you will need to download the following things before we start: Community A-29B Super Tucano Mod Template for the Community Super Tucano by Cubeboy Improved Textures for the Community Super Tucano by Cubeboy Install the module in: Users>user>Saved Games>DCS>Mods>aircraft. Example: Now, open a-29b-community and go to the Textures folder. You will find a single file named A-29B.zip. Delete this file and replace it with the one you downloaded from the Improved Textures link. IMPORTANT: Do not unzip the new file, just delete the old zip and replace it with the new one. The DCS side of things is done, so let's proceed to creating our first livery. Open GIMP and load the template you downloaded. You should be greeted by something like this: It might look a bit intimidating at first, but let me break it up a bit so you can understand what you are seeing a bit more: GREEN: These are your tools, most of them are self-explanatory so try them out to see what they do. BLUE: These are your tool options. This is how you configure the active tool (brush, paths...) RED: These are your layers. You will have several layer groups that can be opened by clicking the PLUS sign to the left of the name, the one next to the image preview window. Group and layer names change between templates, but usually you will find: WEATHERING: These layers will usually have wear and tear effects such as carbon residue from the engines, oil leaks, panel line accents, etc. MECHANICAL: These are usually parts are are left untouched. They include landing gears, wheels and other mechanical elements of the plane that are not as crucial for the look of the skin as they are not part of the fuselage. In general, you can also find parts that might be optional such as radio antennas, formation lights, etc. PD: You usually find these at the top of the template, seeing as they will need to be over all other layers to be visible PAINTABLE PARTS: These are self-explanatory. You paint in these. In the case of the template that I created for the Tucano you can also paint certain parts of the aircraft inside of the Mechanical folder, such as the propeller blades and propeller hub. Now, remember when I explained what a texture was and how 3D models are laid-out over them? There is a better way to see that now that we have the template open. On the layers tab (RED) find the "FULL UV LAYOUT" layer and make it visible by clicking the eye icon. You should see this: Do you see that web of lines? That is our 3D model! By looking at this, you get a much better idea of how the 3D model has been mapped over the texture map. Neat, huh? However, while this might help us in some ways, we are still lacking a small detail. Direction. While we might know it is mapped, this does not tell us if the mapping is inverted. This means that you might have to look at the text to find which parts are mirrored and which are "normal". Imagine the text in 3D space as if it was the wrapper of the Snickers bar. Notice how the top of the wrapper has its text upside down. Well, that is because when it is wrapped it moves to its proper orientation. The same concept applies here. In our case, the Tucano has no mirroring in its texture so you have it easy, for now. STEP 2.2: TIME TO PAINT! Now, as a singer I like used to say: Let's get creative! Open up the "PAINT HERE" layer group to find the place to paint. I have already made a mask for you (the one that can be seen to the right of the preview) so that you can paint like a madman and still make a convincing-looking aircraft! Additionally, I have also given you a couple of pre-made liveries so that you can check how I create them. There is a very important rule when it comes to layers: The ones at the top rise over the ones bellow, meaning that to make a multi-layered camouflage paint you will need to watch how your layers are placed in relation to each other. There is an example of that inside of the template as well! Don't forget to save often, you might lose hours of progress. In my template I have also included a set of decals for you for both PTBR and EN, to make livery creation easier. These are on the Decals layer group, the one above the main painting area. Play around with them and remember, not all template have these so you might have to create your own for other aircraft. Additionally, you might want to tune the weathering to your liking. Use the opacity bar at the top of the layer with the layer selected to make it more or less translucent. I will use the premade USAF livery for the rest of the examples! STEP 3: SAVING AND IMPLEMENTING YOUR LIVERY IN-GAME For this part, I might suggest downloading Notepad++ seeing as we will be editing some very simple code to make all work smoothly and nicely. Now that your livery is all nice and done, it is ready for testing! Let's start by making our livery into a single layer. Go to the LAYER tab to the right, select one of the top layers and right click to get a pop-up menu. Select "New from Visible" A new layer should have been created. Click over this newly created layer and go to File>Export as. This is on the top row of buttons. Export it to your Desktop as a .dds file. In our case, the file name should be a29b_01.dds Select to export it WITHOUT compression (for now) and WITH mipmaps. If you want to compress it with a modern compression standard such as BC7, use paint.NET and save it with that compression there. GIMP is limited to older compression models that ruin quality! You now have your first texture file, but how do you make it appear in your game? Well, this is where the coding aspect starts. I will explain to you how to create a livery folder from scratch and modify a description file that will allow you to see your livery in-game. Go to the Mods folder and open the one for the Super Tucano. Inside you will find the sub-folders, click the one that says Liveries and then the A-29B folder inside it. You will see something like this: These are the liveries that your Super Tucano install has and the ones you see in-game. For convenience purposes, we will duplicate one of these and modify it so that it will read our file! Grab the FAB folder, copy and paste it, and then rename it to something else. In my case, I will rename it to "EXAMPLE LIVERY". Let's open that one: This is what you should see. Now move your a29b_01.dds file here. After you have moved it, it should look like this: Now, let's open the description.lua file with Notepad++, you should see something like this: Appearances can be deceiving, so let's break it down into the segments that you need to know as they are the only ones you will be using constantly. YELLOW: This is the part that declares which part of the 3D model is being called-in. Do not change it as this name is usually set when the model is export it. RED: This is the part that defines which type of texture you are using. 0 in this case means that it is a DIFFUSE (color information or a normal image). ROUGHNESS_METALLIC carries reflectivity information as well as roughness and metallicness. NORMAL_MAP refers to a normalmap, a type of texture that carries height data to emulate depth with light reflections. DARK BLUE: This is the part that declares the name of the texture the game will look for, in our case, the name will be a29b_01 (the one that is there by default on line 3) MAGENTA: This one can be either TRUE or FALSE. If it is set to FALSE, then the game will look for the texture inside of this folder. If it is set to TRUE, it will look for it in the Texture folder for that module or elsewhere. CYAN: This one declares the name that will be displayed in-game. This name can differ from the folder name for the texture (in this case EXAMPLE LIVERY) LIME: This variable is the one that declares which countries will have the livery available for it. I usually leave this space empty as that makes it available for ALL countries, I recommend you do so as well! For our case, we will comment out (remove the two -- at the front of the line) LINE 3. This line already has everything set up for us as it is declaring the part we want (a29b_01.bmp) with a DIFFUSE (0), the texture name (a29b_01) is correct and it is telling the game top search for this file inside of this folder. Change the name to your liking, careful with the syntax as the quotation marks are necessary. Whenever you are more experienced you will find yourself creating your own roughmets and normalmaps, but we will leave those out for now as this guide is intended for newcommers. If you have any questions about. Your description.lua file should look like this now: STEP 4: USING MODELVIEWER2 Did you know that DCS comes with an app that allows you to visualize all in-game models without having to boot the game up? It is called modelviewer2.exe and it can be found in: Program Files/Eagle Dynamics/DCS World/bin You will have to search inside of the bin folder, but once you find it you can always create a shortcut to it on your desktop, which I recommend doing if you are going to use it for skinning your aircraft. Since most of us do not have access to the 3D models unless we are involved with the teams creating them, this program is our best alternative as it has a great number of features: It allows for as close as we will get to real-time editing of textures. It allows you to check the alignment between texture maps for difficult lines. It allows you to look at your textures in-engine, letting you adjust your colors to the ones you desire by looking at how they change once the game renders them. But before we open it up, we will have to edit the lua script that the modelviewer uses at start-up to search for textures on our Saved Games folder, since that is where our mods are. Modify this file at your own risk, but if you follow the guide you should not have any issues. Here is a pre-modified file with the modifications already pre-done, but you will need to edit lines 70 and 71 with the correct file path for your install. But before you do anything, please, back up your original autoexec.lua file. It can be found on: Program Files/Eagle Dynamics/DCS World/Config/ModelViewer As you can see, I have my old file backed up as _OLDautoexec.lua. Additionally, I have a copy uploaded to my GDrive, you can never be sure. After and only after you have backed up your autoexec, do the following: -Unzip the zip you downloaded above -Drag that file and replace your existing autoexec.lua with it -Open the new autoexec and edit lines 70 and 71 with your install path, use mine as an example (Highlighted inside the RED box). -Change the GREEN to your drive identifier letter -Change the MAGENTA to your user name When you are done, save the file. This file gets overwritten with each update so do back up the new file too! With all of this out of the way, let's actually open up modelviewer. the first time you open it you will be greeted with this. Do not get scared by the amount of options, let's break it down. At the top you will have your typical option layout. To load a model, go to the FILE option and click on Load Model. Search for a model, in this case our A-29B, which you can do by navigating the menu. Go to your Users/User/Saved Games/DCS/Mods/aircraft/a29b-community/Shapes. Inside of the Shapes, find a lot of files. Open a29b.lods or a29b.edm Your model is there, now. Fantastic. if it Here are the controls: Right-click and drag to move the camera on the current center. Left-click and drag to move the camera linearly towards or away the current set center. Middle-click and drag to move the focus center of the camera. You can snap views to certain angles by using the icons next to the webcam icon on the toolbar. To change the liveries on your model, open the tools tab at the top and look for the Liveries tool. A new window should pop-up. Look for the designation of your aircraft and on the left side you should be able to see the liveries that are available. In my case, I will chose the USAF AFSOC livery. These should be the results! Your livery loads up and you can inspect it by using the controls described above. If you have made any changes to the livery and updated the dds files, you can also use the reload texture button (The blue ball on the toolbar) to reload that specific livery! This should be enough for you to get started. Experiment and if you have any doubts, I am sure that the folks over at the DCS: Livery Art Group could help you a lot. There are a lot of aspects that I glossed over to keep it short and approachable, so they should provide the help you need if your doubt was not covered in this section. STEP 5: THE MOMENT OF TRUTH Now, go in-game and check your livery out! I hope that this guide was good enough to give you the crucial information that might be needed to start making your own liveries. Go ahead, create and fly! What I thought you here applies to ANY other aircraft, these are just basic concepts to get you going. You can find most official templates on the Download page of the official DCS website. If they are not there, then Google away! About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

It has been almost a decade and a half since Ace Combat X: Skies of Deception launched for the PlayStation Portable (PSP) back in 2006. Personally, it doesn't feel like it was that long ago but indeed, it has been 15 years since ACX released. And like other titles of the era, specifically ones for portable consoles, it is undeniable that the game has aged since then. When played on its original hardware and screen these problems are not as noticeable, but the moment you try to emulate it it is when you realize the severity of these issues. Particularly as you are pushing the game to resolutions it just was not designed to manage. The issue is that emulation has become one of the only ways to play this title. Access to the original hardware is rare and will only become rarer with time. To me, this has been the avenue that has allowed me to truly appreciate the true beauty of this entry in the Ace Combat universe. Let's delve into how PPSSPP and the work of some amazing modders have made ACX into one of my favorite titles in the franchise. Thanks to Ostrich for his help and collaboration while writing this article. ACX ON THE PSP: HOW A GAME CAN BE LIMITED BY ITS HARDWARE (GOOD AND BAD) Just like many others, I got excited when I saw that my favorite franchise at the time was going portable. I had just played Ace Combat 5 on my PS2 and the fact that I would be able to have an Ace Combat title with me at all times made young Cube one happy kid. I finally managed to get my hands on it a couple of years after its original release. Everything was well until, well, I actually started playing it. It was obvious from the get-go that this title was being seriously hurt by its controls. The PSP lacked several buttons and a second joystick, this meant that to yaw the aircraft you would need to take your finger away from the stick to use the d-pad. It is inconvenient and show that, if you wanted to play it like a regular console release, the PSP was not the best fit for the game. I finished it and played it, but it always felt awkward. Additionally, the flat joystick on the PSP did not lend itself well to this kind of game. Was it sufficient to play it? Yes. Was it ideal? Far from it. Story-wise I love this title, it is a proper Ace Combat game in every sense of the word. Despite being limited by its hardware, the developers used it to its limits and presented players with a proper narrative structure told in the best way possible within their limitations. PPSSPP: UNLEASHING THE TRUE POTENTIAL OF ACE COMBAT X Emulation with PPSSPP (a free open-source PSP emulator) is where we can take ACX and let it shine like it never did on console. Almost every single issue I mentioned in regards to the controls are fixed by the ability to use a Xbox controller, a DualShock 4 or any other type controller! This way you can map yaw to the lower bumper buttons, allowing you to finally play it with a very similar layout to all the other home console titles. With the control issues aside, there is only a single major problem that shows its ugly head only when emulating: Low resolution textures. The assets that this game were designed to be seen from the infamously low resolution screen that the PSP had. As a consequence, the moment that you try to push the game to higher resolutions thanks to the upscaling features native to PPSSPP it will look like a pixelated mess. This is where texture modding comes in. For years, AC Fans have been working on HD texture packs that drastically change how the game looks. Today, we'll be featuring Super Ostrich's HD texture pack since it is the most complete one out there. Not only limiting himself to redoing the texture for almost every allied and enemy unit but also re-doing a lot of the UI elements that the game uses. Here is a side to side example so you can see how much these textures change the look of the relatively low-poly models. To the left are the original textures and to the right are the ones included with Ostrich's package. Click to expand them! The UI also goes from barely readable/a pixelated nightmare to something that is incredibly sharp and unrecognizable when compared to the original textures. ACX is still very much a PSP game in function but these changes make it so much more bearable. You can find the latest version of this pack and installation instructions by clicking the button: Additionally, the full list of credits for this pack is on Ostrich's website! I was able to test some of the textures that will be included on version 2.0 of this pack, and I absolutely love them. A lot of attention went into making them, so here are some of the ones I personally found to be excellent. Mitsubishi F-2A with warning labels, BuNos, etc! Boeing F/A-18E Super Hornet with its correct panel lines, markings and BuNo styles. Dassault Mirage 2000-D with detailed panel lines, markings and warnings Saab JAS-39C Gripen with impressive attention to detail, just look at that APU exhaust (left)! ONE LAST ISSUE TO BE SOLVED: 60 FPS The only issue with ACX in PPSSPP is that it is limited to 30FPS. Even when 60FPS is enabled via cheats, parts of the game start breaking. Both Ostrich and Alban (one of the main admins Acepedia) have opened a bounty of USD$475 for anyone that is able to solve this emulation issue. So if you have the technical know-how, go ahead and give it a chance! CONCLUSION I no longer own a PSP and I know that finding one in decent condition as well as a physical copy of ACX will not be easy. If it wasn't for PPSSPP and the amazing community that surrounds it, many of its titles would have been destined to be forgotten. ACX is important to me and the fact that I can enjoy it in a completely different way thanks to emulation is something truly noteworthy. To me, the definitive edition of ACX can only be enjoyed on PPSSPP. PS: Little known fact, but did you know that there is was a beta version of ACX that never saw the light of day? It was most likely a de-bug build used by the developers, but the build date is awfully close to the official for the game. This might be one of the last builds before the game went gold. It has been preserved and archived by the Hidden Place, in no small thanks to DRW, kabojnk and MysteriousCube. If you are curious, info on it can be found HERE. DISCLAIMER: We do not advocate piracy so, if you have the capability, you should dump your own ROMs for your own personal use, here is a short guide by the PPSSPP devs. But with that being said, we stand by data preservation and we understand the importance of not letting these games become lost media. In a world where many of these titles have become hard or outright impossible to acquire legally through official means (official stores or directly from the developers), it is inevitable that some of these games will be lost if we don't do something. Contribute to these conservation projects that are making that dream a reality. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

VTOL VR is a game that, without looking photo-realistic, managed to immerse me like no other game had done in VR. Stable framerates on mid-range machines, immersive cockpit interactivity and unparalleled blend of realism and simplicity. I have always loved this game but, like many, I noticed the biggest flaw that it had: its lack of multiplayer. When we saw that BahamutoD, lead dev and creator of this title, announced that a public test of the multiplayer feature was available both Ribbon-Blue and I jumped right in to test it. I am not going to lie, I was pretty excited when I heard the news. Until then, players had to rely on a community-made third party mod to use multiplayer, so this was a long time coming. The first aspect we tested was the stability of the "netcode", or, how well could clients see each other and how the clients synced. I am extremely happy to report that our experience with this was extremely stable. There was never a case of client de-sync, enabling us to fly in close formation, dogfight and engage targets without any issue. Staggered carrier take-offs and naval ops were awesome to explore in multiplayer, but what really changed the way these scenarios changed was the ability to share information between aircraft to build even more situational awareness (SA) than before. We had more fun in PvE scenarios just because of this. Marking targets with IR lasers at night with night vision googles (NVG) on, planning your own objectives with your friends and using the aircraft to its absolute limits, that is what made this beta worth it to me. Aside from gameplay, I was highly impressed by how smooth the entire experience was. From choosing a lobby to getting airborne, every step of the way is as clean as it can be. Menus are simple and easy to read and before you sortie out, you enter a briefing room where you and your teammates can plan out everything, load your weapons and go. It is impressive, but I kind of expected this. After all, this same level of polish was first seen in BahamutoD's secondary title: Jetborne Racing. This racing spin-off served as testbed for networking within the developer's framework, allowing him to hone his skills to make VTOL VR's multiplayer transition even smoother than it could have been. VTOL VR's multiplayer is the last piece in the puzzle for me to consider this as a must own title for everyone with a VR headset. You have to try this out for yourself. It might be hard to adjust to not having physical feedback from a joystick, but believe me when I told you that this compromise is well worth it for the immersion that you will experience. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

VTOL VR has a great variety of playstyles for you to choose from. From the heavy and only true VTOL aircraft, the AV-42C, to the agile, fast STOVL like the F-45A. But it was always missing a crucial type of aircraft that is the definition of vertical take-off and landing: a proper helicopter! That has now been addressed with VTOL VR's first DLC, the AH-94 Attack Helicopter. Launched on the 6th of January, 2022 alongside the multiplayer update, this aircraft is the first addition to the VTOL VR line-up in quite a while, aside from mods of course. Let's see how this rotary wing treated us in its first days of release. INITIAL IMPRESSIONS At a first glance, it is pretty evident that this design is a mix of several western attack helicopters, with heavy influence coming from the Comanche and Apache airframes. The cockpit design is pretty much straight out of US Army helicopters, specifically, the AH-64A/D. It has a large set of sensors and most of them are intuitive and easy to manage if you have any knowledge as to how any of the other aircraft work in VTOL VR. Some of its systems, such as the TADS and its augmented vision mode are exactly the same as they are in the F-45A. If you had any experience with that aircraft, you should not have any trouble transitioning over to the AH-94. But the same cannot be said about its flight dynamics. After all, last time I checked the only moment when a F-45's wings rotated was when I got hit by a SAM. FLIGHT DYNAMICS For not being a full-on simulator, it is pretty solid! You have to manage your systems and engines the same way as you would have to do on any helicopter. It flies mostly as you would expect it to, as a fast helicopter even when loaded to the brim with Hellfire missiles and a full belt of 30mm. It is extremely agile as well, letting you do plenty of wacky maneuvers. It is a sim-lite, after all, you have to have some fun. There is an aspect which was pretty weird to me, and that is the behavior when the helicopter entered an overtorque situation. It just spazzes out, pitching up and down. I tried applying all of the techniques I use in other flight sims where helicopter flight models demand that you do "proper procedure" per aircraft in order to recover from those scenarios, but to no avail. The only way to get it out of that state was to drop the collective all the way down and pitch nose down and right after that, pulling up. An example of this is in the video below: It felt weird and somewhat broken, in a gameplay kind of sense. I like that the developer took the time to implement something akin to the difficulties that are experienced in rotary wings, but the implementation is a bit quirky. Again, I could just be talking out of my previous experience and putting unrealistic expectations into something that does not need them. MULTICREW This is the first aircraft in VTOL that allows two players to fly in the same aircraft. To say that this is fun would be an understatement. This is, by far, some of the most fun I have had in a while. Coordinating attacks with another Skyward staff member, RibbonBlue, planning out strategies, delegating tasks and utilizing the aircraft to its very limits. That is what real teamwork is, and with a good friend by your side, you can not go wrong with the AH-94. It is an incredible experience, and one that would be flawless if it were not for the plethora of issues that we had while trying to use multicrew. I had several crashes to desktop and freezes, all of which were only while playing the AH-94 in multiplayer. But, at the same time, these crashes were extremely inconsistent and we had zero issues during our second session which lasted 2 hours. If you have VTOL VR, you need to try this experience out. It is fun, challenging and exciting at the same time. Bring your best pal along for the ride, you will not regret it. About the Author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

Those enamored by flight will pursue it wherever it can be found. It's the type of passion that drives people to look up when they hear an aircraft overhead during their everyday lives. This same passion is not restricted to aircraft, but to any kind of vehicle whose size and magnitude stuns one's mind at the mere sight of it. Submarines, tanks and war machines all do this. Our second interview for Creator Highlight Month 2022 (CHM) is with Wolfpack345, a video creator and streamer who mostly covers historically-focused games, be them flight games, submarine simulations and tanks battles from WW2 and beyond! We had the pleasure to have a delightful interview with him and are honored to have him as a guest in our first CHM! First off, we’d like to thank you for accepting our interview request. Could you start by introducing yourself and telling us a bit about what you do? I am happy to conduct an interview! Thank you for having me! I run a YouTube and Twitch channel by the name of Wolfpack345 and Wolfpack345Live respectively. I mainly focus on Air Land and Sea simulation content on the channel. I do try to do things a bit differently than just showcasing gameplay however. I try to make my videos cinematic, and I also like to inject RPG elements into these sims I play on the channel. Additionally like a lot of people interested in these types of games I do have a passion for history. I integrate that passion into my content as well. How did you get started with flight simulation? Do you have any early childhood memories about your early experiences with them? I first got into flight simulation with the first iteration of the IL-2 series. Around that time I also played some Combat Flight Simulator 2 and 3 but I do not remember them as fondly. I am a bit newer to the genre than a lot of other folks. That being said I played loads of the original IL-2 and some of those campaign missions in the 109 and IL-2 will stick with me forever. I still have the original disk! Along with Forgotten Battles, Pacific Fighters, etc. Your channel is mostly WW2-centric for almost every game you cover. How did you grow to like this era and what aspect do you consider to be the key one that caught your attention? The Second World War has certainly been an interest of mine for a while. Naval combat and more specifically submarine warfare is what I would consider to be the key area that catches my attention. That being said I am fascinated in the air war as well and my interest don’t only lay with WW2. I find the First World War extremely fascinating. Especially when it comes to the aircraft. I do feature a good amount of WW1 flying on the channel in Rise of Flight and Flying Circus. The reason WW2 is so prevalent on my YouTube channel isn’t really due to lack of interest in other time periods. It mainly has to do with what is available game wise. The Silent Hunter series covers the two most prevalent submarine campaigns of WW2. Other than that, there is not much in the way of modern subsims. Dangerous Waters is a modern submarine simulation released in 2005 however it has not aged as gracefully as Silent Hunter 3 & 4. That being said it seems things are changing. Of course there are more WW2 games coming out that I am interested in like Task Force Admiral however there are also more modern naval games on the horizon like Sea Power and Modern Naval Warfare. I am positive all of these titles will be main stays on the channel. Which other flight-related titles have you played that you personally enjoy but that you haven’t recorded yet to your channel? As far as titles go there is only one flight sim that I am interested in but have not played on the channel and that is Wings Over Flanders Fields. A WW1 flight sim that looks like it could be tons of fun! There are plenty of modules I would like to showcase in DCS that I have not shown on the channel. The MiG-21 for example is an aircraft I would love to make videos on and will be doing soon. Same with the P-47. One of the most popular franchises that you cover in your channel, and one that I particularly enjoy, is Silent Hunter. What would you say that is the factor that attracted you to the series? Is there anything in them that you would think is shared between it and your passion for flight sims? Silent Hunter 3 & 4 are two of my all time favorite games and Silent Hunter 3 probably takes the number one spot! I absolutely love the tension and thrill these submarine simulators provide. There is absolutely similarities between flight sims and subsims. Just like in aerial combat in naval combat positioning is more than half the battle. Both of these genres certainly reward patience as well. Taking your time to acquire more information before diving on a target or engaging a convoy can prove to be extremely beneficial. If you rush in you may just miss a destroyer nearby or a 2 more Bf-109s looking to bounce you. How long does it usually take you to make a complete video from start to finish? I suppose it varies a lot from series to series. Oh boy… The answer is… it depends. My Silent Hunter 4 videos are the ones that take the most time. Silent hunter is a rather slow game to play and a lot of the time you are just waiting around or chasing the enemy down. It also depends on what I am trying to do in the video. A lot of times I will spend lots of time working on a transition that maybe only a handful of people will notice but it is all about learning new things and implementing new editing techniques. I always try to improve; it is a never ending battle however it gives me a sense of satisfaction when I see a finished product. I am quite proud of my latest content, but I am sure in a year or so I am not happy with the quality. I feel this way about my older content now haha. When I first came across your channel it was due to your IL-2 Great Battles videos. What is it about IL-2 that made you make it one of the primary titles in your channel? I do play a lot of IL-2 on the channel! One of the main reasons for that is its career system. I love the ability to make a pilot and try to keep him alive as long as possible. The “dead is dead” style of gameplay really appeals to me (in flightsims and subsims) and allows me to tell a story over the duration of a Youtube series. I have a history of playing a lot of Role Playing games and I certainly transfer some of that into flight simming. The career mode in IL-2 (and Rise of Flight) makes it very easy. Additionally, I like the variety that IL-2 brings to the table. Lots of aircraft and fronts to take part in and learn about! Despite having a preference for WW2 aircraft, you do have some experience with Digital Combat Simulator (DCS) and its mostly modern set of aircraft. Is there any aircraft that you particularly enjoy over the others? I really enjoy the early Cold War jets a lot! I love the F-86 and would be ecstatic to see a proper Korean War scenario in DCS World. As of late I have been flying a lot of the MIG-21 and 19. Both are really fun jets with a lot of character. Although I prefer the older stuff, I do find my self in the Hornet a lot and it is probably the modern jet I am most proficient in. I have been dabbling with other modern aircraft though. Such as the F-16 and F-14. As I play more and more DCS my interest in these aircraft has increased. As for the more modern aircraft in DCS such as the Hornet, what has been your experience with them so far? Is there anything you have personally liked/disliked about them? The Hornet was my first full fidelity module in DCS and it has been one fun ride learning it. It has been a very rewarding experience learning that aircraft. I still remember the first time I did AAR. There is not much I dislike about these aircraft. I just like aircraft that try to kill you a lot. The Mi-24 Hind was way more fun than I expected. I have had a blast flying that helicopter. We’ve noticed that you cover IL-2 Great Battles a lot more frequently than DCS on your channel. Is there something about IL-2 that attracts you to more to it? Like I previously said the career mode for IL-2 is fantastic and I would love to see something similar in DCS world. You recently released an article about how DCS is multiplayer dependent, and I agree that it is. Although I love flying multiplayer it is a bit harder to craft stories around these multiplayer sorties. I try to make my content unique, and I have just not found a way to do that with the multiplayer missions. I do tend to stream DCS multiplayer, however. The other big turn off for making DCS content is the replay system. With how finicky it is it can really be a chore to make content with it. I do have plans for more DCS content. I did the Hunters over the Yalu campaign on the channel, and I loved it. A new series will be coming soon. Have you flown any of the World War II aircraft in Digital Combat Simulator? What are your opinions on them as someone that primarily flies in IL-2? I really enjoy the WW2 aircraft in DCS! I have primarily flown the P-47 and love the way it handles. I do want to do more with it for sure. My main issue with DCS WW2 is the plane set in conjunction with the maps. The BF-109 K4 and FW-190 D9 just don’t line up with the time frame of the maps. That is kind of a turn off admittedly. I think that is why I like IL-2 more for the WW2 stuff. Just the sheer amount of variety really makes me feel like there is a war going on. The world feels more alive to me. Of course, like everything there are tradeoffs, DCS for example has some strategic bombers which IL-2 lacks. Both are fun and do some things better than the other. The Korean War era “Hunters over Yalu” campaign is the only full DCS World campaign you’ve recorded. Do you have a favorable opinion of Korean War era aircraft in DCS? I do have a very favorable opinion of these aircraft! I think they are very unique and loads of fun. Unfortunately, DCS doesn’t have much in terms of content for these aircraft. The Hunters over the Yalu campaign was top notch and I would really recommend it but there is not much else for the F-86 besides that campaign. There is even less single player content for the MiG-15. I would love to see the Korean war properly done in a flight sim. I do believe it is a very interesting conflict and would be a blast if properly done. In addition to that I think the Cold War would be a great place for DCS World to expand in the future. So many fun platforms and unique gameplay opportunities are there. As a content creator, are there any features you would like to see added to DCS? The biggest thing that I would like to see in DCS is an overhaul of the track system. It would really help with making cinematic content and allow me, and others to show off DCS in all its glory! Regardless of this issue I do plan to make more DCS content and look forward to what the future has in store for the sim. That will be it, thank you a lot for answering our interview! Is there anything else you would like to add before we conclude? I really do not have anything else to add! I really appreciate you giving me the opportunity to come on here! It has been a pleasure. About the interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

I believe the term "more than meets the eye" might be the best way to describe my experience with Frontiers Reach so far. There's more going on with this game than even its Steam page lets on. It has been in development for at least two years now by Blind Alien Productions. Following a massive project shake-up in December 2021, Frontiers Reach hit its second wind after multiple significant reworks to the project's gameplay, flight model, story, and overall scope. Following the game entering beta on October 29th, 2022, Skyward Flight Media got in contact with the game's development team to get more information on the project and help identify some gameplay bugs. There are so many functions, customizations, plot points, weapons, galactic travel options, and other topics to discuss; I need more time with Frontiers Reach before attempting to summarize them all. I've been taking my time playing this game from beginning to end, but it's too early to write anything like a review. Instead, I'd like to discuss a few things that have caught my attention so far. Responsive Development Team An odd point to start on, sure, but highly important for any game at this phase of its development. Since I started playing Frontiers Reach, I've been surprised at how responsive the development team is to bug reports. Quick fixes to specific bugs or more overarching reworks are published within hours to a day or two after they are reported. Rather than hold off on creating massive quality-of-life updates every few weeks, a steady stream of updates has maintained the team's presence even among its beta testers and quality control team. There is plenty more work to do before the game can be considered complete, but seeing fixes and updates applied within such a short amount of time is heartening for any game in early access. Unexpected Story, Expansive Campaigns The initial story setting for this game is prime for the classic tale of the heroic fighter pilot singlehandedly winning the war. As mentioned in the introduction, in the year 2230, two human factions that control vast areas of space are preparing for all-out war. Here I assumed the player would take the role of a brave pilot bringing peace by skillfully defeating one side while flying for the other. But in Frontiers Reach, the player is not diving into danger for glory. Instead, they are attempting to save the lives of people living on the fringes of the known galaxy by avoiding the coming war. Here, victory is survival at any cost - even if it means stealing fuel, facilitating prison breaks, raiding mercenaries, or ambushing government patrol fleets. The ultimate goal is to flee to uncharted space before the war inevitably ravages entire star systems. The overall feeling of the story is heavy. The vagrant nature of the crew with few loyalties to anything, coldhearted objectives that involve breaking laws to save lives, and the sometimes frenetic combat make the experience invoke memories of popular sci-fi series like Firefly and Battlestar Galactica. This was a refreshing change from the tried and true hero formula. Destroying a heavily defended fuel depot to cause chaos so you can slip into a factory to steal supplies later isn't a standard mission set you'll find in most flight games from the past or present. Surprisingly, this game has two single-player campaigns. The first campaign is linear and story-driven. It comprises 20 main missions with some side missions offered by allied characters between missions. This campaign introduces the setting and story while familiarizing the player with controls, game mechanics, managing resources, meeting the cast, and traveling across the galaxy. It is a complete campaign from start to finish, despite technically being the "introduction". By the end of the 20th mission, a second, more dynamic campaign begins, putting all decision-making power in a galaxy-wide conflict into the player's control. With 37 nodes (planets, locations in deep space, etc.) being contested by different factions, the second campaign is worth an article all on its own. You can be sure that I'll write thoroughly about it for my next article on this game. Advanced Controller Support The list of supported controllers is still expanding, with more settings for controllers being added by the developer. Today, custom keybinds for keyboard-mouse, gamepads, and flight sticks have been included. Including multi-USB controllers like hands-on throttle and stick controllers are something I plan on testing with a variety of sticks I have on hand. More on this later. Flight Model The current flight model has been completely overhauled from its earlier build. Even while flying the most maneuverable spacecraft available at this time, the smooth turning characteristics are notable. Epic turning battles with half a dozen fighters are commonplace. Most of the combat happens within blaster range (gun range). Even with the few guided missiles equipped, the fighting style is more like World War II or the Korean War. Expect to turn and burn for superiority in each mission. Depending on the throttle setting, a consistent turning radius can easily be maintained, letting players focus more on their maneuvers without getting too wrapped up in the finer points of flight you'd expect from a full-fidelity simulator. Turns can be enhanced by momentarily using the reaction control system to make course corrections or snap turns to catch adversaries off guard. With the reaction control system equally effective in the atmosphere and space, it's an ace in the hole for players under challenging situations. There is a considerable feeling of momentum and weight with each spacecraft. That's more apparent in some than others. Those factors help smoothen out gameplay from becoming so fast-paced and twitchy it is unwieldy. But in low-speed, low-altitude situations, it's one of the most significant hazards to players. Landing, searching for resources, and the admittedly difficult segments that require flying through buildings, space stations, and underground tunnels are much more dangerous than being fired upon. More than once did I find myself carefully flying slowly at 5+ degrees nose up in a system of caves to avoid early warning radars. Learning how to manage low throttle settings during low-altitude flight is a lesson learned through trial and error. Fortunately, the game allows players to respawn up to three times per mission without a checkpoint system that automatically saves progress. With Frontiers Reach still undergoing development in its open beta phase, I look forward to continuing the process of getting to know a game I should have checked out much earlier. About the Writer Aaron "Ribbon-Blue" Mendoza Co-founder of Skyward Flight Media. After founding Electrosphere.info, the first English Ace Combat database, he has been involved in creating flight game-related websites, communities, and events since 2005. He explores past and present flight games and simulators with his extensive collection of game consoles and computers. Read Staff Profile.

We have not only one, but two winners. Surprise! The results of our spur of the moment giveaway are here! Once again, the Google Random Number Generator was used to select the winners for this giveaway. The winner for this month's giveaway are: Blaireau tarnished (@palemoon_hunter) Tomtomb (Website Submission) Skyward Flight Media would like to thank everyone that participated and helped spread the word to others to participate! The winner will be contacted soon to begin discussing their prize. Here's to many more years!

In just a few days, Skyward Flight Media will be celebrating its third anniversary. Naturally there must be a giveaway! DIGITAL COMBAT SIMULATOR GIVEAWAY From March 20th, 2023 to March 23rd, 2023 we have a Digital Combat Simulator World giveaway. Taking advantage of the current sale, we are offering one (1) winner the prize of any map or module available in Digital Combat Simulator on the Steam or Standalone version of the simulator. The winner for the DCS giveaway will be contacted on March, 23rd, 2023. HOW TO ENTER This year, we have two ways to enter this giveaway. Follow SkywardFM on Twitter and like our pinned 3rd anniversary giveaway tweet. Retweeting is not required, but helping spread the word is appreciated. For those that do not have a Twitter account, they can fill out the Contact form on our website. Please include your Name and/or Screen Name, email address and that you are entering the giveaway, so we can contact you if you win. Skyward Flight Media will announce the winner publicly in a tweet and blog post on March 24th, 2023. Thanks for joining our giveaway and supporting our three-year celebration efforts, Skyward Flight Media Staff

The easiest way to describe what it provides is "task-focused gamification" without compromising simulation. While official Digital Combat Simulator World campaigns made by third-party developers are the gold standard, there are a lot of creative mission editors with names that may never be as well known as Reflected Simulations or Baltic Dragon. In July 2022, I was severely bitten by the DCS mission editor bug. With a demand for more dynamic multiplayer missions on Skyward Flight Media's DCS World server provided by Fox 3 Managed Solutions, I dove into the world of mission editing. While watching tutorials and meeting others with mission editor experience, the hot topic at the time was a mission known as Foothold by dzsekeb. I was downloading missions from the User Files section of the official DCS website to study them for inspiration, so I looked into the Foothold mission as well. A few months of multiplayer server management made me understand why large-scale dynamic multiplayer missions, like Through The Inferno, are so popular. When providing a large number of concurrent players with access to as many aircraft as possible and multiple sub-missions in a single mission file (.miz), it's obvious that only a massive scenario with just 1000+ units could fulfill that. These missions either continue forever with respawning objectives, or they're so enormous it may take up to a week to complete. The allure for players is the ease of flying with friends for a few quick sorties and little-to-no restrictions, but the nebulous mission structure doesn't have set terms for "a victory." Combat continues forever. Most of these missions are for fast jet fixed-wing aircraft with minor consolations for rotary-wing platforms in designated areas. In my opinion, the format of Foothold missions interests people because of a few key points that set it apart from the usual multi-faceted multiplayer missions. CAPTURING AND HOLDING TERRITORY From the start, the name "Foothold" denotes how the BLUFOR side starts with a single airfield to its name, while REDFOR controls multiple bases, airfields, oil fields, and other locations; they are referred to as "zones." In the F10 map, all friendly, hostile, and neutral zones are shown with a clear indication that the goal is to occupy all zones on the map. Players are the leading force against REDFOR, though a limited number of computer-controlled BLUFOR units assist with zone capture and defense. As other zones are captured, more allied computer units are launched, and in turn, hostile forces may launch counterattacks to reclaim lost zones. Territories can be captured and have their defenses upgraded by both sides. These areas are captured by removing all hostile units from them, then transporting supplies to them via ground forces or helicopters. After being captured by friendly troops, these zones can be upgraded through the same methods. Each upgrade adds more defenses to make them harder to be re-captured. Some of the captured zones have specific functions. There are forward deployed airfields for faster deployment into combat, Surface-to-Air Missile sites that can be upgraded with various types of missiles. Some facilities provide a passive kind of support that is a vital function of the Foothold mission style. POINT SYSTEM Players are incentivized to fight, survive and hold territory with a credit system. These credits can call in "off map supports" to counter against the overwhelming REDFOR advantage. The points of all BLUFOR pilots are added to a shared pool for all players to use at will with the radio menus. These supports include SEAD flights, fighter sweeps, cruise missile strikes, and time-limited AWACS. However, 100% of these credits can only be recovered when players successfully land at a friendly airfield or aircraft carrier. Even after the aircraft touches down, there is a ten-second timer before points are given to BLUFOR, leaving a small window for a botched landing to result in all credits the player just earned being lost. 25% of the credits gained during a sortie can be recovered if the pilot successfully ejects from their aircraft, but it is a fraction of the overall amount. Credits can be gained passively by capturing and holding zones like the oil fields and factories mentioned earlier. They provide the side that controls them with credits at a set rate of time, but their vital structures can be destroyed, which removes their ability to produce credits passively. Protecting or destroying them to deny their use is a part of a long-term strategy. HELICOPTER INCLUSIVE DESIGN Foothold missions give helicopters a place to shine. For logistics, BLUFOR relies on computer and player-controlled helicopters as the primary means to capture and upgrade zones. By either sling-loading supplies or "virtually" loading the supplies inside the helicopters, a handful of sorties can turn a basic defensive position into a well-defended forward arming and refueling point (FARP) for easier helicopter operations. Having a player that flies helicopters available can be a game changer since they can focus on rapidly capturing and upgrading zones faster than computer units can. In combat, they can remain near zones for extended periods using terrain to protect themselves, then fly to any nearby-friendly zone to resupply. As REDFOR sends their helicopters or land convoys to capture BLUFOR zones, helicopters can be the first defenders to respond because they can remain forward deployed. Pilots that have ejected from their aircraft can be recovered by player-controlled helicopters that choose to perform combat search and rescue missions (CSAR). By either landing near or hovering above the pilots, helicopters can pick them up and deliver them to nearby friendly zones. Recovering one pilot grants more credits than shooting down an enemy aircraft, making CSAR a worthwhile mission to fly. MODS SUPPORTED FOR LOGISTICS Adding aircraft mods to the mission is simple enough, but the mission has optional logistics functionality specifically for the UH-60L Black Hawk Mod and the DCS Super Hercules mod by Anubis. With one of the most capable transport helicopters and so far the only transport aircraft available for free, any player can get in on running logistics. The Super Hercules mod is particularly interesting because it can airdrop supplies into friendly or neutral zones, making capturing and upgrading zones farther from airfields a much faster process. REASONABLE ENEMY VARIATION While there are enemy combat air patrols, surface-to-air missiles and columns of armor to fight against, Foothold mission designs do not go overboard with modern weapons capable of shooting down aircraft 100 nautical miles away or intercepting allied launched missiles. There is a balanced mix of threats that still let less advanced aircraft be effective in combat. Even early Cold War aircraft or light attack aircraft like the DCS OV-10A Bronco by Dikennek/SPLIT AIR or the A-29B Super Tucano Community. can be used with success. AUTOMATIC SAVING As mentioned in the description of the User File page, Foothold missions automatically save progress locally, but servers for online multiplayer operations can be modified to save progress there as well. While this sounds minor, I can assure you that automatic save functions that retain players' progress on the server keep players eager to continue. DOCUMENTED CUSTOMIZATION Foothold missions are well documented for customization by mission editors with brief, understandable explanations on how to add new zones, name groups, and set up supply lines for computer units to upkeep. That's not to say that it's easy to modify an entire Foothold mission in just five minutes, but it's more accessible to begin the mission editing process. While Skyward Flight Media has mostly been playing the Caucasus version of Foothold, we have plans to start on the much larger Syria version soon. We recommend trying this mission with a close group of friends to experience its full potential. About the Writer Aaron "Ribbon-Blue" Mendoza Co-founder of Skyward Flight Media. A lifelong aviation enthusiast with a special interest in flight simulators and games. After founding Electrosphere.info, the first English Ace Combat database, he has been involved in creating aviation related websites, communities, and events since 2005. He continues to explore past and present flight games and sims with his extensive collection of game consoles and computers. | Twitter | Discord: RibbonBlue#8870 |

Initially published 05/03/2022 // Minor Corrections: 3/11/2023 If you find yourself going to public servers in DCS World, you will find all sorts of people flying their favorite modules. Places like Hoggit's Persian Gulf at War, Growling Sidewinder's Open Conflict, Through the Inferno and the 4YA servers are the most popular ones as of the time of writing, with relatively high average player counts no matter the time of day. It is in places like these where one can take a glace at what the "average DCS player" flies, and it is only logical that some trends will start to show up. Evidently some of these trends will change overtime but for the past couple of years there have been two planes which have taken Digital Combat Simulator by storm. These two are the F-16CM "Viper" and the F/A-18C "Hornet". Go to the servers I mentioned previously and it will be evident that both of these modules surpass the others in terms of numbers. A lot of people seem to have taken a liking to these planes, myself included. But why? Today let's try to rationalize some of the possible reasons as to why these aircraft dominate DCS World. THE DEFINITIVE JACKS-OF-ALL-TRADES The multirole nature of these aircraft is, most likely, one of the main reasons behind their popularity. If you buy a Hornet or a Viper, your mission set is not set in stone. You can go against a swarm of enemy fighters, do close air support, reconnaissance, long range strikes and precision strikes. All of that with a single module? Sounds like a dream come true. Does this mean that these two are the best at every single role? Not by a long shot. If we were to talk about the king of beyond visual range (BVR) air to air (AA) engagements, then there is little that the F-14A/B has to envy from these modules. The same goes for more niche tasks like the dedicated low altitude air to ground role (AG) and anti-ship role which would be better served by module like the AJS-37 Viggen. But that is the point. You do not need all that specialty when you can do everything well enough. As the saying goes: "a jack of all trades is a master of none, but oftentimes better than a master of one" Both of these modules are more than capable of holding their own in almost every single scenario possible. There really is no compromise when it comes down to their armament. I have seen F-16s go on Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAD) mission and then running a Close Air Patrol (CAP) right after they have struck their target. I have seen Hornets hit an entire airbase by themselves and later dealing with the interceptors that were sent to dispose of them. Hornets and Vipers engaging an enemy fleet together is not a rare occurrence. They are also capable of being some of the best air to air platforms in the sim. The Hornet is infamous for being able to carry 10 AIM-120s, which is one of the best missiles in-game. The Viper has an unparalleled thrust to weight ratio, too. This allows it to lob missiles at distances that are only rivaled by what the F-14B can do with its Phoenixes. This is not a measure of realism or accuracy, it is just about the capabilities that these modules have in-game. THE "BANG FOR BUCK" RATIO This is an aspect which is usually not taken into consideration by more avid flight sim aficionados. Our hobby is an expensive one and when someone new to this world, there is a very important decision that they need to take: "Which module do I buy?" or "What should I spend my money on?" This is a question that which has an infinite amount of answers. Each person will have their own priorities and needs that lead them to choose an aircraft. For someone who is confident that they will be playing DCS World or any other simulator for a prolonged period of time, it is easy to just choose what they like at the moment and then get something else later. But, what happens when the person in question does not even know if they will be playing this simulator in the next 30 days? It would make sense for this person to get something that can show them what DCS has to offer. Two modules fit this definition perfectly: F/A-18C and F-16CM. The Hornet, in particular, offers every single mission set and situation possible, including being able to land and take-off from carriers. The same is applicable to the Viper, excluding carrier operations. At this point it is a matter of buying something with more bang for your buck, and that is exactly what these modules offer: A full perspective of the depth and richness of modern air operations in DCS World. As stated previously, both the Hornet and the Viper offer some of the best that DCS has to offer in terms of system modeling and depth. They are very easy to get started with but they are relatively hard to master, demanding you to read and research about their systems. You can cooperate with other aircraft with your datalink and targeting pod. You can do everything. Does this mean that these are the perfect starter aircraft? Yes and no. But, would you prefer having the capability of being able to learn something with what you own or having to buy another module just to have the chance of doing it? I will leave that up to you to decide. GLOBAL MILITARY AVIATION LEGENDS This is an intangible and emotionally-driven aspect, but it is one that certainly affects how we perceive aircraft. This will require me to get a little more personal. When I was little, I always got to see my country's F-16As and Bs fly by my house every time that we had a national holiday. When I look at the sky I can always see those distinctive silhouettes flying above me, a formation of three F-16s in a delta formation with their engines roaring and shaking the windows. It is only natural that I have grown attached to these machines, is it not? I might not be a supporter of my current government but those "Dragones" are one of the only military assets that make me feel something for my country. Seeing as the F-16 is one of the most common 4th generation fighters in the western world, I am certain that many others around the world have that same attachment. A memory of happier times when we would watch these planes soar high above at breakneck speeds, shaking the very ground we stood upon. This does not only apply to younger people, but to older ones too. Which should be evident by the time these aircraft have been in service. Unsurprisingly, airshow teams could also be a part of the reason behind the fame that these two aircraft have. The Thunderbirds and the Blue Angels fly the Viper and the Hornet respectively, with only the Blue Angels having changed to Super Hornets recently. Thousands upon thousands of kids and adults around the world have seen these demo teams perform incredible maneuvers with unbelievable precision. The same can be said about the RCAF's Demo team, the Turkish Solo Viper Demo, BAF's Solo Display Team, RSAF's Black Knights and the HAF's Zeus Demo! All of which take these aircraft to their absolute limit. Additionally, we cannot overlook the role that media plays in these attachments. Movies and TV series almost always depict the "good guys" with F-16s or something that looks like them and, whenever there is a carrier usually a Hornet follows shortly after. Of course, the elephant in the room here would be Top Gun's star: the Tomcat. It is obvious that the Tomcat is not only an aviation legend, but also an icon of aviation media. The same principle applies, it is this fame and perception we have of the aircraft that makes buying a full simulation of them that much likely. Which is is why a lot of people have bought the cat, too. Aside from it being one of the most complete and polished modules currently in the sim. That being said, the Tomcat does not really fit into the "bang for buck" category. It is one of the most expensive modules in the game and its usual discounts during a sale are lower than both the Hornet and the Viper. Furthermore, while it is capable of performing both air to air and air to ground missions, it lacks that full multi-role functionality even while having the Jester AI companion helping you out on your missions. Its weapon and mission set is very limited too, in comparison to the Hornet and Viper. It is one of my personal favorites, but I can understand why both the Hornet and Viper are more popular with the average DCS player. This does not mean that it is a bad beginner aircraft, quite the opposite, it is excellent due to jester AI managing all the systems for you. These three aircraft are icons and legends, but both the Hornet and Viper have a much more visible trail in the minds of aircraft fanatics all over the world. A fact that is backed by the amount of countries that have bought these aircraft, keeping them in combat roles to this very day and for decades to come. It is this presence and visibility that have engrained these airframes into our minds, making it so that it is much more likely for us to gravitate towards them. THE REIGN OF A BUG AND A SNAKE: A DESERVED ONE When it comes down to it, we will all like what our preferences lead us to and to what our life experiences have made us believe is the right choice. This "reign" of the Viper and the Hornet is not going to be everlasting. DCS World is a very dynamic sim in which aircraft are added constantly, all of them fitting a certain niche. It just happens to be that both of these aircraft fit well into most niches, lending themselves to be must-buys for any player. I do sense that a challenger to this reign is fast approaching, one that has been preparing itself to become either the next ruler or a new member of this ruling council. An aircraft as capable as these two but with some inherently unique features that make it familiar but distinct enough to the point that it can be a justifiable purchase for owners of the current ruling modules. The Strike Eagle is screeching and hunting for prey. We will just have to wait how complete and in which state this new bird of prey will launch. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

In a genre where speed is life, moments where you can sit back and take in the sights of the world as it passes by make you appreciate things. Floating on the ocean's surface just a few minutes after settling your aircraft on the water, the ambient activity of civilization and nature just seems enhanced. It has been about 11 months since The Brew Barons by Lifetap Studios completed its Kickstarter campaign, and I still return to its demo for a taste of the experience. The demo is certainly outdated by now. It has not received updates since March 2022, but it still represents the core of the gameplay experience and the overall concept. The developers have been heads down, working, albeit with seemingly few updates. While their social media accounts may not be posting a screenshot a day, they're hard at work. According to their Kickstarter updates and Discord conversations, the cast of flying brewers and bossy pirates has expanded with new skills, new characters, new side stories. Even a new ability for co-pilots to provide minor repairs while they are in the aircraft. Further visual upgrades to this already beautiful game have been paired with performance optimizations, resulting in a reduction of 2 to 3 GB of RAM usage. But between the VFX polish, new soundtrack and aircraft customizations, my mind remains focused on the ever expanding world. The Brew Barons' open world seaplane gameplay still has me swooning over possibilities. Even more so with a series of updates about how the open world is still expanding. A proper world map is under development to assist players with navigation, managing quests, brewing orders and deliveries. It shows the locations like ports, towns, bars, salvage wrecks and areas with known ingredients. Even the general locations of known brew pirate divisions. It's a vital tool in any open world game. The way the islands are generated in the playable portion of the open world. Using a random set of rules, all islands are generated only one time when a new game is started. Meaning each new game changes the locations of the islands and the locations of towns, ports, landmarks, salvage wrecks etc. This is an important step towards increased replayability. Also remember that some of these islands have the potential to have rather complex topography, an example of flying through caves was showcased quite some time ago. The single landmark in the public demo was a way to both encourage players to explore and expand the lore of the region. With more of them confirmed in development, it gives players a good reason to occasionally set aside their brewing jobs and explore every island they see. There is more life coming to the game as well. The already bustling towns with people traversing its walkways and boats sailing freely are being expanded with hot air balloons, ships at sea and even whales in the ocean. I'm especially interested in the floating markets that relocate themselves from time to time. After landing via sky hook, players can purchase uncommon goods and even have them shipped back to their base of operations. Even the amount of "less-than-friendly" life has increased. In the demo, a few brew pirate aircraft appear, but that's nothing compared to three new pirate divisions centered around armored warships, submarines, massive flying boats and an armored blimp - each of them with smaller escorts using similar types of vehicles. The wider variety of baddies to bash further adds to the life in the islands. On October 24th 2022 a delay moving the release date back into QI and Q2 of 2023, but with the additions made and further expansions to come, this delay for higher quality is hardly a concern. As stated in our previous content about this upcoming game, its greatest strength is letting its players indulge in a true aviation adventure. Crop buzzing, island hopping, soaking in the scenery, occasional bouts of combat and a bit of entrepreneurial spirit - it's the type of stuff adventures are made of. About the Writer Aaron "Ribbon-Blue" Mendoza Co-founder of Skyward Flight Media. After founding Electrosphere.info, the first English Ace Combat database, he has been involved in creating flight game-related websites, communities, and events since 2005. He explores past and present flight games and simulators with his extensive collection of game consoles and computers. Read Staff Profile.

Two free to download Skyward themed liveries for the DCS F-4B/C Phantom by VSN Century Series Digital Combat Simulator. Check out our first impression of this mod here . F-4B/C Skyward CAG Designer : Cubeboy Release Date : 2/3/2023 F-4B/C Skyward Low-vis Designer : Cubeboy Release Date : 2/3/2023

Flight simulation and flight arcade, as a genres, are vast. From casual entries such as Ace Combat to the full-fidelity representations of Digital Combat Flight Simulator, the spectrum of realism has no end. Some people prefer a casual experience, untethered by the shackles of realism; while others prefer feeling like they are in a virtual representation of a real aircraft that they have to learn and master to even be able to do the simplest of tasks. This is where a game like Tiny Combat Arena (TCA) comes into play. A mix of realism and casual gameplay, this game offers a plethora of fun scenarios for you to enjoy. Let's talk about TCA, its gameplay and features to see if it is a fit for you. DISCLAIMER: We were provided a pair of press copies by TCA's publisher, Microprose. There was no embargo or any strings attached. We had complete editorial control over this article. WHAT IS TINY COMBAT ARENA? If you want to learn about this game's past and its development, we highly suggest looking at our series of articles about TCA. This includes our full look at this game's history and a two part interview with its developer. With all of that out of the way, let's talk about TCA. TCA is a sim-lite flight game with heavy inspirations from flight simulators from the 1990's, if that wasn't evident by the art style. It reminded me a lot of the old Novalogic and Jane's games, but the game where it seems to have gotten the most inspiration from was Parsoft Interactive's 1996 title: A-10 Cuba! Something that the developer does not shy from admitting. At its core, TCA is a spiritual successor to these flight sims of old. From its gameplay style to its looks. It is quite unique in this, and I love how the developer managed to emulate this art style without compromising too much. The use of dithering to create opacities for materials is excellent. It looks great and, best of all, it does not feel unnatural. Here is an example of what I am talking about. Check the smoke, dust and explosions as they use this old-school rendering technique very well: GAMEPLAY AND THE HARRIER GAMEPLAY: Gameplay-wise, this game is both familiar and unique. Familiar in the sense that it integrates an instant action mission creator (Quick Mission Builder of QMB) that reminded me a lot of the one that IL-2 1946 has. You can select different pre-made scenarios (Strike, Dogfight and Free Flight), which you then customize to your liking. For the dogfight mode you can set distance to merge, situation (neutral, advantage or disadvantage), altitude and the general loadout for the aircraft involved. You can also set AI difficulty levels, which will determine their behavior during combat. It is pretty complete, and I can see myself using it quite a lot. As for Strike mode, there are also plenty of options to keep you entertained. The QMB is all fine and dandy, but it is not the meat of what TCA is all about. That title falls to the Arena mode. This mode can be seen as a pseudo-dynamic base capture mode. Two factions fight over control of several bases, fighting to capture them with their armored units as well as air support. A single map is available at release for both QMB and Arena modes: Sand Island. Living to its name, the map is not big. One could even call it tiny, but the game loop has been structured in such a way that you will not feel the need to wander around for long. In Arena mode, as you can see below, the map has 5 different bases. Your side spawns with two under your control, while the enemy has three. The arrows indicate the direction armored units are taking as you do not have direct control over their movement. These lines are as a pretty good indicator of where frontlines have been established. Your objective is to support your units and secure all bases for your side. Only then you will win. Simple yet entertaining. Ground units and air units do their own thing and move around, engaging enemy combatants at will. It is quite amusing seeing them in combat. THE HARRIER The only flyable aircraft in TCA, the Harrier will be your workhorse. It is capable of carrying insane amounts of firepower, both guided and unguided. While some people might be disappointed that all the other aircraft are not flyable, I sincerely do not mind it. Its flight model is quite realistic in the way that it behaves. You lose airspeed as you do tight turns, you gain airspeed on a dive. There is certainly a solid energy management game here, one where the aircraft does not feel like a paper plane that you can throw around like it weighed nothing. You will have to conserve your fuel and care about your stores because, after all, they are not unlimited. I had a lot of fun dogfighting against MiG-21s! The VTOL controls are a dream. Don't go thinking that they are exclusive to doing landings and take-offs. Just like with the real Harrier, you can move your nozzles mid-flight to make your turns tighter under certain circumstances, or just straight up move yourself on a different axis to set yourself for a shot. This is what Vector in Forward Flight or VIFFing is all about. EARLY ACCESS, BUGS AND THE FUTURE Despite all the praise that has been said, not everything is perfect. One has to be aware that this game released in Early Access so bugs and issues are to be expected. This in itself is not an issue as many games have done this before. The problem comes from a just a couple of bugs that just cannot be fixed, at least according to what I have talked with the developer. The first of these is a floating point precision error that occurs when the player moves in the vertical axis. The higher you go, the more it is noticeable. While it is only a minor annoyance at 5K feet, it really starts to show once you go above 15K feet. Here is an example of this error. The developer said that this problem is caused by the rendering/game engine limitations, so the further away you go from the origin point, the worse this effect becomes. It is not something that can just be patched out. The other bug is one that affected me personally, but might not affect you. It is related with controllers and the way the game currently sees input devices with negative axis controls. These lead to infinite acceleration, allowing you to go Mach 9.4 or more. I will not lie when I say that this bug frustrated me to no end, as I was unable to fly as I was meant to. It was borderline unplayable. I reconnected my controllers time and time again, resetting their bindings and remapping everything countless times. But there is is a good side to all of this frustration. This is currently being worked on by the developer, who has been extremely open when it comes down to addressing and fixing bugs that they community finds. As time moves on, I expect a lot of the major and minor bugs to be removed from the game as it receives more polish and content. Why485, the developer, has shown that he cares deeply about fixing and tidying up his game, something that is commendable in this day and age where the broken AAA games are the norm. CONCLUSION I have personally wanted for quite a while. A casual yet deep experience that threads the line between simulator and arcade. It is a fun game by nature, one that has a lot of promise. While it lacks content at the moment, I am sure that Why485 will add more maps, mission types and scenarios for us to enjoy as time moves on. A After 10 hours of flying it I can say that I sincerely enjoyed my time with the Harrier, too. Its systems are basically non-existent aside from having to manage fuel and keeping an eye on your ammo. Everything is gamepad friendly, yet, I still feel the same joy as I would feel from flying in a complex simulator such as DCS World. It is that balance that defines what TCA is. What we have here are some excellent foundations for an even greater game. Congratulations, Why485! About the author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as the co-founder of Skyward Flight Media. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

(REVIEW FIRST POSTED 04/02/2020) Released back in 2016 with fairly good reception the F-5E-3 "Tiger II" module by Belsimtek is one of the most popular for DCS World as of 2020, being a solid all-weather fighter with air to air and air to ground capabilities. It is an old module with a lot of limitations but at the same time a lot of features which make it an excellent beginner aircraft. In this review we will be taking a look into several different parts of the module and evaluating if this fearsome little bird is a fit for your style of flying. These points will be divided in several sections: External and internal 3D models Visual and sound effects Flight modelling Mission capability Armament Ease of use and learning curve Module content issues Is this aircraft for you? EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS A very important part of any module is the way that you, as a player, perceive your aircraft as a tangible and well recreated version of the real life counterpart. In this regard, we got a very detailed recreation of the aircraft when it comes to the external and cockpit models of the module. In the external model one can see that a lot of attention to detail was put into it from the air vent animations to the wing flex that happens when you maneuver harshly or while rolling around on the taxiway/runway. I have got to admit that this is a feature that I wish more modules had, as it is present on all the "must have" aircraft such as the F-14A/B, the F-16CM and the F/A-18C. There will be a video of this in action in the next section of the review. The cockpit model is good but not without flaws. Even though it is pretty accurately modeled, the textures are falling a bit behind when compared with the more modern modules such as the F/A-18C by Eagle Dynamics or the F-14B by Heatblur. Some parts feel too lifeless, lacking depth and reflections that are present in more recent releases. Here are a couple pictures, scroll around and judge for yourself. For example: the gun camera casing, which is one of the objects you will be looking at the most thanks to its location in front of the gunsight looks a bit too faded, like it lacked color depth and definition. This is mainly due to the age of the module now being close to 4 years old as the writing of this review, which would make these non-updated textures a relic of the older lighting engine present in DCS as the time of its release. VISUAL AND SOUND EFFECTS Something crucial for a simulator is the sound design, since it is one of the only ways that the player can receive feedback from its plane when the airframe is stressed due to high-G or high-alpha scenarios, while rolling down the runway or even when getting into a compressor stall. This is one area that the F-5E-3 does great and at the same time it lacks. External effects are great, you can easily hear the engine going through the entire RPM range and hear the distinct sound of the afterburners kicking in and feel their force, even though they are one of the weakest afterburning engines in DCS. Cannons have that characteristic sound that echoes through the canyons after you fire, accompanied with the smoke deflectors that make the smoke go over your canopy in order to avoid flaming-out the engines with the exhaust gases. Overall, fantastic. Animation-wise, here's one of the more notable examples of the wing flex that occurs: When it comes to the in-cockpit sounds, things are not as excellent as the external ones but still pretty solid. The flaws derive from a certain lack of feedback when clicking the switches or turning the dials, which can be somewhat frustrating. The engines are the main problem when it comes to badly designed in-cockpit sounds mainly because, when flying at higher speeds or at high-alpha scenarios, there is not a notorious change in sound when the afterburners are on. This can be troublesome during a dogfight when you have to keep visual with your enemy at all times and you can't afford to look at the fuel flow gauge or the instrument panel in general, which is the only reliable mean to know when you have passed the afterburner detent. Other modules such as the AJS-37 "Viggen" give you a very distinct engine sound when your aircraft goes into afterburner at the cost of realism. We as players need that feedback since we cannot feel the vibrations of the engine or the rumble of the wheels. Here is a recording at full in-game audio for both ground and in-flight engine sounds from the cockpit so you can judge this for yourself: EXAMPLES: Engine sound while on ground: ( Idle-->Full Afterburner-->Idle ): Engine sound while in-flight: ( Idle-->Full Afterburner-->Idle ): FLIGHT MODELING This is a make or break for the product since it is the most noticeable characteristic of every module. Thankfully, this is one of the most pleasant and good-feeling aircraft to fly in DCS. The Tiger handles like a glove and responds very well, even more if you have the dampeners turned on (although for fine control, I would suggest having them on at all times). The feedback from going into high-g and high-alpha scenarios is enough to tell you that you should probably ease up on the controls. Stalling the aircraft is genuinely difficult and even if you get into a stall it is very easy to regain control by applying the standard recovery methods. One thing to have in mind is that the F-5E-3 has a relatively low thrust to weigh ratio of around 0.58 with afterburners on which means that you have to conserve your energy well during a dogfight since you do have the capability to bleed it very fast thanks to the turning capabilities of the aircraft. In addition, the Tiger does not respond well to pitch down movements since it has very bad authority in that axis. Although some real Tiger pilots have said that the engines and the flight modeling feels "off" or "inaccurate", the FM behaves in a believable way and are pretty most accurate to what's on the manual. Each version of every aircraft will behave differently, so pilot feedback can either be the best feedback you can have or an outlier in the data. Most if not all users/buyers of this module would not have flown the F-5E, even less the F-5E-3 on the same exact configuration, making this flight model accurate enough for the purposes of DCS. In summary, there is a reason why this aircraft is used as an aggressor flying red air for the USAF and this is why. MISSION CAPABILITY Weighing only 10,659lb empty, this fighter is very lightweight but this does not mean that it lacks the fangs to rain death upon the skies with a maximum take-off weight of 24,663lb which means a lot of punch for such a small machine. And thanks to the drag chute, it is able to land almost anywhere but it will still need a lot of runway to take off. While it is indeed and all-weather fighter capable of day and night operations thanks to its AN/APQ-159(V)-3 Radar giving it night interception capabilities with the aid of an AWACS, it is restricted to WVR (Within-Visual-Range) combat since it lacks radar-guided missiles of any kind, no BVR (Beyond-Visual-Range) capabilities whatsoever. You also don't have a modern HUD (Head-Up-Display), everything is done through the AN/ASG-31 lead computing sight and its operational modes, which can be surprisingly accurate under the right circumstances. This is not a 4th Generation aircraft and it shows, but don't let that deter you from what this aircraft is capable of thanks to its loadouts which can be somewhat versatile and pretty powerful for such a small fighter. ARMAMENT M-39 20mm CANNONS: These two 20mm cannons are the most noticeable armament of the Tiger since they are one of its main means to attack both air and ground targets thanks to their versatility and reliability. Having 280 rounds each and firing in between 1500 to 1700 rounds per minute, these are surely going to provide you a lot of fun times annihilating MiG-21s and APC convoys. AIM-9 SIDEWINDER: These IR guided missiles are the only air to air weaponry you have in this aircraft so make sure to get used to them and their quirks. They might not be as maneuverable as you could like but they are still fairly useful when it comes to engaging aircraft that are at 2nm or closer. You have three variants at your disposal: GAR-8 / AIM-9B ( Rear-aspect early variant, very unreliable ) AIM-9P ( Rear-aspect with longer range, better boresight and G-loading ) AIM-9P5 ( All-aspect variant of the AIM-9P ) BOMBS You have a very good selection of GPBs at your disposal which allows you to obliterate almost everything that you could encounter. You have four GPBs in your arsenal: Mk.82 (500lb~) and its high-drag variant the Mk.82 Snake Eye (500lb) Mk.83 (1,000lb~) Mk.84 (2,000lb~) M117 (824 lb~) If what you want is to obliterate a bigger area you have the CBU-52B General Purpose Cluster filled with 220 BLU-61А/B bomblets. Finally, for precision bombing you have access to the GBU-12 (500lb~) Laser Guided Bomb. Of note, you cannot utilize this bomb on your own since you do not have an integrated targeting laser. You will require the assistance of either another player with an aircraft that has a laser designator or an AI JTAC to guide your bomb onto the target. ROCKETS Launching a salvo of rockets on top of a convoy is always fun, so it is good that you have 2.75-inch rockets available to spread death and destruction. There are two pods to choose from: LAU-3 ( Nineteen 2.75-inch rockets) LAU-68 ( Seven 2.75-inch rockets) AN/APQ-159(V)-3 RADAR Limited in range (40nm-5nm) and very susceptible to ground clutter, this radar is your eye in the sky that will allow you obtain target data for your gunsight for maximum accuracy. It is easy to use in its two main modes: Dogfight (DG) and Search. While in DG mode, your radar will act like it had a FLOOD mode by locking the strongest, closest target to the boresight of the aircraft letting you get fast and almost instantaneous gun solutions whenever you are in a pinch. DEFENSIVE EQUIPMENT Just as important as the capability of destroying your enemy is your ability to avoid being destroyed in the process. This is done through two main means: The AN/ALR-87 radar warning receiver (RWR) will notify you of any radar contact in its cone of detection and when one or more of those contacts have opened fire at you. This system is quite reliable and gives you some situational awareness unlike other planes that will be competing in the same category as you, such as the MiG-21. When you are indeed fired upon, your best friend will be your АN/АLE-40 countermeasures dispensing system, which consists of 15 flares and 30 chaff that are droppable in either single mode or multiples via programs. Additionally, you do have an IFF system (Identification Friend or Foe) but with the disadvantage of not being able to interrogate, but your allies can indeed interrogate you to avoid blue on blue situations. EASE OF USE AND LEARNING CURVE The best thing about the Tiger is its cockpit flow design and shallow difficulty curve for basic operations. This aircraft does not punish you if you commit some mistakes here and there. It is very forgiving, reliable and predictable from its radar to its gunsight. Engine start up requires connecting ground power to the aircraft, but nothing about the process is either difficult or troublesome. Landing the aircraft is also very forgiving with help of the drag-chute, giving you the capability to land in shorter runways without the worry of a runway overrun. As long as you treat her nicely during landing and you do not smash her into the pavement like a navy pilot, she will treat you well. The main flight instruments are easily readable and the radar scope is very intuitive if you have ever operated a radar before. The RWR equipped on this aircraft is simple and easy to both read and interpret, giving the average player a tool that allows them to have a better survivability rate than with a Fishbed or a L-39. Weapon management is as simple as flipping a switch and pressing the trigger with the only difficulty being encountered while using the gunsight to bomb accurately, which can be solved by practicing by yourself or with the included training missions. I would recommend this aircraft to both new and old players just for this reason. I don't joke when I say that it is easy. MODULE CONTENT ISSUES This module has one main issue when it comes to what ships with your module when you pay for it, this being the lack of substantial pre-packaged single-player content. In fact, there is not a campaign that comes included with this module with the only ones available that were made by the developers being sold as separate pieces of DLC that require that you also have the NTTR (Nevada Testing and Training Range) module installed. It is only fair to compare this module to others of its price range such as the AJS-37 "Viggen" which comes with two campaigns that follow a very loose story-line, multiple single missions and instant-action scenarios. In the other hand, the Tiger II only comes with the expected tutorial missions, some instant-action scenarios and merely five dedicated single-player missions that can each be completed in around half an hour at most but typically take much less if the player is experimented with the platform. These modules are not cheap and most people have to weigh-in their purchases very carefully to get the best possible experience out of their modules, making this lack of content a net-negative category for what is an amazing module. IS THIS AIRCRAFT FOR YOU? If what you want in a module that has an easy learning experience with room for mastering your abilities. If you want a solid dogfighter that needs a more hands-on approach when it comes to maneuvering but that can still handle gunfights with powerful 4th generation aircraft such as the F-15C "Eagle" and the Su-27 "Flanker" in the hands of a good pilot. If you get satisfaction from bombing targets without all the blips and bloops of a HUD with a CCIP indicator and you have the patience to practice bombing approach patterns to secure those hard-to-hit targets. If you don't care about the lack of a campaign and are fine with the package that is included with the module because you eagerly away to destroy MiGs on the multiplayer scene. If all or some of the above is what you want then the F-5E-3 by Belsimtek will not disappoint. Images from: Official Flight Manual by Belsimtek and Santiago Cuberos. Area 88 skin (Shin Kazama) by Noel Shourai About the author Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

ORIGINALLY POSTED: 09/30/2020 | SMALL UPDATES: 3/12/2022 Even predating Digital Combat Simulator (DCS) as a platform, the Ka-50 Black Shark has the longest history of any module out there. Initially released in 2008, the then standalone Black Shark module was a success. Later on it was improved with a subsequent update which made it the Black Shark 2 in 2011. But do not let its age trick you into believing that this module is not worth it, as there is absolutely no doubt that this coaxial helicopter is a staple aircraft of both DCS: World and Eagle Dynamics themselves for a reason. Today we will be taking an in-depth look at this module, its upgrades, its capabilities and its future so that you, the reader, can determine if this peculiar whirlybird is for you. For that purpose, this review will be divided into several categories: External and internal 3D models Audiovisual effects Flight modelling Mission capability Armament Ease of use and learning curve The future of the module Is this aircraft for you? EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS The Black Shark is a very unique-looking helicopter which can be identified immediately by almost everyone who knows a bit about helicopters. Fortunately, the in-game counterpart does this look justice. I was quite surprised by how detailed the external model was at first, since I was expecting a much lower quality model from a module that has its roots over a decade ago. It has lower resolution textures, for sure, but it is still good looking even after all these years. OLD BUT STILL DECENT The most detailed items on the external model are the lifting rotor mast and the cannon assembly. These two have higher resolution than some other details and they are pretty well animated for the time. It is worth noting that some of the default textures lack resolution and can not hold up to modern DCS standards, but it is not game breaking in the slightest. The cockpit, oh boy, the cockpit. At the moment, the Ka-50 has one of, if not the prettiest cockpits in the simulator thanks to the updated 3D mesh and high resolution textures it got earlier in February 2020. This all-new model has nothing to envy from much modern modules such as the Hornet or the Viper. It is simply a spectacle to see and a pleasure to use when compared to the older, very dated cockpit model. The fact that this came as a free update to all owners of the module is something I do have to applaud Eagle Dynamics on, that was a really good move on their part. Here are some screenshots of the cockpit, please scroll through them to see the different panels and how the illumination affects them. Overall, while dated, it can still hold up for a little while. At least until Black Shark 3 arrives with its complete overhaul of the external model, its textures, etc. AUDIOVISUAL EFFECTS In this category, the Black Shark has some pretty interesting effects up its sleeve. The external lights look pretty much how they should with the exception of the blade tip lights which seem to be a little bit too dim to really be noticeable. There are not any grandiose vapor effects like in the fixed wing aircraft but there is something interesting that was animated but I will mention it on the flight modeling section as it is more pertinent there than here. Sound-wise, the Kamov sounds a bit more muffled and quiet than other helicopters but as far as I am aware, that's something that all coaxial systems have. The lack of a tail rotor means less noise, naturally. This does not mean that it is "quiet" per-se as rotary wing aircraft are going to be loud even at a stand-still; but when comparing it to the Huey or the Mi-8, it is relatively quieter. Inside of the cockpit it is pretty easy to know how your engines are performing just by listening, which is excellent and something that other modules lack; primarily fixed wing aircraft. The different audio warnings and advisory alerts have distinct sounds making them easy to differentiate even in the middle of a combat situation. The ones you will be hearing the most are the rotor overspeed warning, engine overspeed warning and your radar altimeter; you will like to fly this bird low and fast so get used to those. EXAMPLES: A short hop, notice the blade sound and engine ramp up as I start taking off, then the radar altitude warning kicks in and then the blade sound as I stop myself to enter a hover): A fly-by at the Kamov's top speed, 305 km/h. You can be sure that the overspeed alarm was ringing like crazy. FLIGHT MODELING Before I start, I would like to clarify that I am mostly a fixed wing pilot. Most of my thousands of hours of flight sim experience have been with all sorts of fixed wing aircraft, not with rotary wing. I do not know the exact number of hours I have spent on rotary wing aircraft on both XPlane11 or FS2004, but I know it is not enough to say that I am deeply knowledgeable on how helicopters behave inside flight simulators but I can defend myself with them. So my opinion in this category is one that comes from a more amateur side, unlike my fixed wing reviews. I will not be judging its realism either as I have never flown a helicopter in real life, and the only "real" helicopters I have flown are mini-coaxial RC helicopters as a child. That being said, even being such a rookie, I decided to make the Ka-50 the first full-fidelity helicopter I have ever tried in DCS. I was immediately surprised by how different it felt from other helicopters I had tried in the past. It was very easy to hover thanks to the characteristics the coaxial system which eliminate many of the undesirable torque-related behavior of single rotor helicopters. The only downside I noticed at first glance was the poor yaw authority it had, which is another quirk of coaxials. It is a very acrobatic machine, regardless of the yaw authority issues it has. Be careful while flying as you can enter a vortex ring state or hit your blades. At high speeds, there is a noticeable reduction in agility but I would not suggest being aggressive during this scenario either way due to the behavior the rotors have when pushed to these scenarios. Excuse me if I am wrong, but from what I know this is because the faster you fly, the more the rotor rolls to counter the blade's roll tendency. If you pull up on the cyclic, even just a couple of degrees, your blades will impact each other and your helicopter will not be more than a glorified hunk of metal barreling towards its fiery grave. At least you can eject from it. The Ka-50, being a single seat helicopter, had to be designed with pilot comfort in mind as the pilot had to also serve the role usually assigned to the gunner in other attack helicopters. For that reason, it has a very friendly autopilot system which acts as both an actual autopilot which follows waypoints as well as a stability enhancement system which helps the pilot through the entire flight envelope of the machine, even featuring an auto-hover mode. This helicopter is friendly to fly thanks to its coaxial system, its autopilot and its responsive collective controls. It is a fast and mean machine which taught me how fun helicopters can be. MISSION CAPABILITY This helo excels at what it was designed to do, which is to attack enemy armor while being able to perform reconnaissance of enemy positions and passing that information to allied units through its datalink. It is a front-line helicopter through and through. Of course this doesn't mean that it isn't capable of performing other more generalized tasks such as cargo lifting. Unlike the Mi-24P, the only task it can not perform is troop transport. THE "SHKVAL" TV SENSOR This front-mounted camera suite is what allows the Ka-50 to engage from a relatively extended stand-off range. It gives the pilot the ability to do target designation, recon and self-lase to use the beam-riding anti-tank missiles. When used alongside the "ABRIS" Advanced Moving Map System, it could allow several Ka-50s to communicate between each other sharing the intel they have gathered. This alongside the Helmet Mounted Sight (HMS) makes it easy to plan ahead and engage on the spot. The Black Shark can be just as scary as it is sneaky. I can plan ahead with updated enemy info provided through datalink, attack a target while popping in and out the terrain leaving the enemy wondering what happened. All without having to rely on in-game tools such as the F10 map or anything like that. That's just awesome. ARMAMENT SHIPUNOV 2A42 30MM CANNON A weapon which is shared between helicopters and APCs, this dual-fed cannon is a devastating weapon. Capable of utilizing both HE and AP shells on the same loadout, it offers versatility on the battlefield. You get 240 rounds of HE and 220 rounds of AP. AT-9 VIKHR (9А4172) ATGM This peculiar missile will be your main anti-armor weapon as you will have 12 at your disposal if you load two of the APU-6 launchers. With a pretty decent range between a half and eight kilometers during daytime conditions, these missiles are precise and get the job done. Kh-25 LASER GUIDED MISSILE This is the largest and deadliest single weapon you can carry on the helicopter. Possessing the longest effective range and the most precise delivery method, this missile is a must when you want to ensure that your target will not get away. I mean, this missile is indeed capable of sinking medium-sized ships under the right conditions! UNGUIDED ROCKETS When precision is a relative matter, these pods can pulverize an entire city block full of MRAPs without breaking a sweat. And you get different sizes to choose from too. From the 80mm S-8 rockets to the larger 122mm S-13. UNGUIDED BOMBS Although not the most effective weapon carried by a helicopter, you do have the option to carry both FAB-250 and FAB-500 unguided bombs as well as bomblet dispensers. Accuracy is completely out of the question with these weapons as you mostly have to rely on the good ol' Mark.1 Eyeball to determine the impact zone. Just like in ye old days. UPK-23 GUN PODS These are the most fun weapons to use, second to the unguided rockets. These are for those occasions in which you need the power of two GSH-30MM cannons apart from your own internal cannon. These have the same cannon as the one mounted on the MiG-21s, by the way, so these do not play around. Ammo is quite scarce, make it count! DEFENSIVE AND SURVIVAL EQUIPMENT Flares, flares and flares. This helicopter has one hundred and twenty-eight flares, sixty-four per dispenser. You can rest assured that if an Igla comes straight at you, the least of your worries should be running out of flares. You also have a more discrete but equally effective defensive system in the form of your L-140 Laser Detection System. Being composed of several laser sensors, you will know when someone is painting you with a laser and from where, allowing you to evade accordingly. But, if everything else fails and you found yourself trapped inside a flaming chuck of metal, you have one last line of defense to ensure your survival.The K-37-800 ejection seat means that, if you are still alive inside of the helicopter, that at the very least you will have a way out. Before ejection, all of the blades are blown away by explosive charges to avoid collision. It can be quite spectacular seeing it happen, just hope it does not happen to you! EASE OF USE AND LEARNING CURVE This helicopter is, in my honest opinion, the easiest one to get into. It has a lot of computer assistance and the lack of noticeable torque effect makes it infinitely simpler to fly than all the other helicopters available in Digital Combat Simulator. When it comes down to flying, those helicopters are more about the cyclic and rudder inputs to keep control of the aircraft. The amount of videos I have seen of people dying (both in-game and of laughter) in the Huey while trying to hover it for the first time is immense. And do not get me wrong, I like those helis as much as I like this one. But for a newcomer, the Kamov does feel a lot more friendly and intuitive. The only tricky part for me was getting used to using the trimmer, but that was about it! If I, a relatively amateur heli pilot, can fly it even from outside the cockpit to get shots like this; I am sure most other people can. Navigation is easy too, thanks to the "ABRIS" Advanced Moving Map System. The map is easy to read and pretty useful for almost everyone. Overall, this helicopter is a wonderful little machine engineered to be simple to use. You have some training missions as well as a few campaigns to practice with, but as far as I have seen, the campaigns have not been updated in a long time making them kind of broken with the current terrain. Just be mindful of this when going in. THE FUTURE OF THIS MODULE Just like it just happened with the A-10C module as of time of writing, the Ka-50 is also receiving a paid update later in 2021. This update will not only add a new and improved external model made to the current DCS standards of quality but it will also add new capabilities such as the ability to carry air to air missiles, updated sensors and much more. We do not know much about the current state of development for the Black Shark 3 module, but we do have a couple of screenshots of the WIP updated external model. It's looking pretty good so far! I have high hopes for this release. It should be able to fix most grievances I personally have with the current module by and maximize the enjoyment factor of this wonderful machine. UPDATE (MARCH 2022): As of the writing of this update, we still do not have our hand on Black Shark 3 (BS3) module. A lot of things have changed since the writing of this article. The initial feature proposal has been reduced due to a change in Russian legislation. This means that we are not getting certain features anymore, the extent of which we still do not know. What we know is that we are still getting an updated Black Shark, one with better sensors and a much needed overhaul to the external 3D model. The last look we had of this new model was during the New Year 2022 trailer. Here it is: For now, all we can do is wait. But rotary wing fans will have a new toy to play with, the Apache. It is slated to release during March, and the product has "gone gold" already. IS THIS AIRCRAFT FOR YOU If what you want in a module is: A fun and exciting aircraft. To dominate ground forces from a distance. A solid flight model with some interesting quirks A unique flight sim experience. If you don't mind: Getting used to a new type of aircraft. The lack of air to air weaponry. The dated external model. Being bullied for becoming a rotary wing fan. If all or some of the above is what you want, then ED's Ka-50 Black Shark 2 is for you. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and content manager ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

To say that this module has been highly anticipated by the community would be an understatement. Well over a year after first being teased and numerous delays, we finally have our hands on the AH-64D in its early access period. As it is an early access (EA) product, this will only be a first impressions article. We will only be talking about the features that were available at launch. We will also update this article as features are released, so stay on the lookout for that. EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL MODELS The external model is extremely detailed, as would be expected from a flagship-type product from Eagle Dynamics. Almost every single aspect you can think of has been detailed to an absurd level. It is, sincerely, one of the prettiest models I have seen in DCS so far. I can not say I am surprised by this level of detail, but I am glad that we have it in game. Below you will find a gallery with the model from several angles. There is something that I personally found to be a bit lacking with this external model: Its unwrapping. Texture-wise, it has an extremely unintuitive layout. For simple things such as emblems and basic decals, it is fine. The bigger parts of the model are flat and not super segmented. The problem lies in the details, quite literally. As someone that enjoys making liveries, this one has me divided as to if I will ever tackle complex camouflages or not. On a more positive note, let's take a look at the cockpit model. It is nothing short of beautiful. Its textures and details are absurd. The more you zoom in, the more details you will find. Subtle dirt build-up around knobs and buttons, scratches on the panels and exposed primer. Even the colored reflection that the screens have once they are hit by indirect sunlight is there. ED, stupendous job with this model. Kudos to the hardworking 3D and 2D artists! FLIGHT MODELING First, I will clarify that I am not a certified helicopter pilot nor do I hold any licenses. I will not be judging its realism either; as I have never flown a helicopter in real life, and the only "real" helicopters I have flown are mini-coaxial RC helicopters as a child. But, that being said, I have spent quite a lot of time with simulated helicopters in DCS. The Apache feels stable and is stable, once you get used to the way its trimmer works. If you do not have a force feedback (FFB) stick, then please do yourself a favor and change the trimmer options in the Apache's Special menu to Central Position Trimmer Mode, as this mode is more tailored to the average non-FFB HOTAS. With that said and done, I find the Apache to be an incredibly agile bird. She just... moves the way I want her to. She has been modeled, according to people that know a lot more than I do about Apache flight dynamics, extremely well. Effects such as ground effect, VRS and even realistic settling with power situations have been implemented. The effects of torque feels realistic enough that I will not even complain. It is that good! Still not perfect, but an excellent start. Hovering her is extremely easy once you get that trim just right. The only aspect that took me a bit off-guard is the fact that this is the slowest attack helicopter in-game. With a full combat load (eight Hellfires, two rocket pods and around 75% fuel) I can only achieve a maximum of 135Kts on level flight. This is still faster than a Huey but it is slower than a Mi-24P (170/180kts) or a Ka-50 (165/175kts), both of which with similar combat loadouts and fuel loads. This limitation will only be a hindrance on longer flights, but I am sure that with good mission planning it will become unnoticeable. SYSTEMS MODELING AND GEORGE AI This is what the Apache is all about. Its systems are the most advanced of any western helicopter we have gotten so far, and rival or surpass those available on the Ka-50. This is not a module that you can pick up and learn on a single sitting, no sir. You will need to set some time aside to learn how to navigate its displays, targeting modes, weapon delivery modes, etc. You have an all-weather capability as well as one of the best if not the best night fighting capabilities of any helicopter in DCS at the moment. The Apache rules the night thanks to its night sensors and integrated displays within the Integrated Helmet and Display Sighting System (IHADSS). If you want something dead, it will most likely die. As it stands right now, this helicopter is capable of quite a lot but we are still missing some critical systems such as Link16 (Datalink) integration with other modules, numerous system display pages and, most worrying of all, its signature Longbow radar system along its radar-guided Hellfire variant. These systems will be implemented as the EA period progresses and I have no doubt that ED will deliver on these promises. But enough of this, let's talk about the elephant in the room: the George AI. George AI is the computer companion system that allows you, as a lone pilot, to operate a strictly twin seater aircraft. When you sit at the controls, he will be your co-pilot/gunner (CPG), managing all the weapon systems for you. All you have to do is instruct him on what to do using the relatively intuitive interaction menu and you are good to go! When you sit as a the CPG, George will handle the flying for you. He is a bit rough around the edges when it comes to flying, but if your commands are clear and not sudden then he manages it like a champ. I sincerely expected him to be a lot worse at flying than what he is, it makes me wonder what kind of black magic is happening in the code to make him fly like this. WEAPONS M230 30MM CHAIN GUN The only weapon system that you will always have on-board, this cannon is lethal all the way to 1.500m. Thank to its capability of being controlled both by the Target Acquisition and Designation Sight (TADS) or the IHADSS, it is extremely versatile when it comes down to self-defense and engagement of unarmored targets. HYDRA 70MM ROCKETS Your standard, run-of-the-mill unguided rockets. There is nothing special about them. They will do what rockets do: fly fast and explode upon impact! AGM-114 HELLFIRE The main weapon system of the Apache, these missiles are capable of penetrating anything that you fire them at. For now, we only haver access to the AGM-114K, the laser guided variant. Once the Longbow radar is implemented, we will get access to the radar variant of the Hellfires: the AGM-114L CONCLUSIONS If what you want is to have a helicopter which basically flies itself, one that has the capability to destroy every single target imaginable both during the day and at night. If you don't mind it being an Early Access product, the lack of crucial systems and the slower than average speeds for an attack helicopter. Then and only then, I can truly say that the Apache is for you! About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

Flight simulation is a surprisingly diverse when it comes down to player-base diversity. From teens, late-teens all the way to young-adults and adults. This means that they all coexists in the virtual skies we all fly upon. I have met some incredible friends that, regardless of age and demographic, are a blast to play alongside with. I have found that, in my years of observing and being part of several communities for a variety of games and titles, the ways that someone can find enjoyment inside of a flight simulator are almost limitless. Civilian-focused sims are some of the finest sandboxes to get lost in, something that is even more noticeable now with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 and its almost 1:1 replica of the blue dot in the sky we call home. DCS World is not exception to this rule. I have seen some people enjoy it for the search and rescue missions, others for the relaxed feeling they get for flying a warbird or the thrill of modern combat and some for the detailed single-player campaigns. While limited in its possibilities, DCS offers an amazing set of tools for you to enjoy flying over the skies of the Caucasus, Nevada, the Persian Gulf, Syria the Mariana Islands and even the English Channel! While there are some that worry exclusively about performance data, flight models and the newest "meta" in DCS, you should never feel guilty about liking what you like in DCS World. Do you enjoy flying warbirds at breakneck speeds over the Channel hunting the Luftwaffe? Then go for it! Are you one of those that enjoy flying helicopters and going on precision PvE strike missions alongside your buddies while they fly top-cover for you? Then you would probably fit well on my friend group. Or are you one of those that actually worries about the competitive aspect of DCS, learning the minutia of each and every modern competitive aircraft, including how to properly notch missiles from every range? Then you are probably more skilled than I am. But never, never let someone else tell you how you should or should not enjoy your time when you fly in DCS. You do not have to feel the need to be the best pilot in the sky or the one that knows every single system. If you have that need, then let it be a personal one and something that you personally want to strife for. My heart breaks every time I see someone online say that they were interested in DCS World but were intimidated by its community. That perception that your typical DCS player is an armchair fighter pilot who acts like a know-it-all is one that we need to get rid off. So, please, if you want to try DCS, do it. Do not be intimidated by the shadow of elitism that looms over DCS World. It is a game at the end of the day, and games are meant to be fun. Some of the best moments that I have had in DCS have happened while flying in challenging but unusual ways. Yesterday night I had one of those moments alongside my friend Erika, as we flew the A-29B Super Tucano mod together. Everyone else was flying jets but we decided to venture head-on into the fight with a pair of turboprops. It was a blast and I would do it again, no questions asked. So stop worrying about how good of a pilot you are or if you should be flying something else. Enjoy what you do, and aim for what you want to aim. Let yourself enjoy your time upon the virtual skies. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

It has now been two years since aviation established a footing in VRChat (VRC). It is a number that rolls easily off the tongue but that carries with itself a very important connotation. It means that, despite all odds, aviation related communities are not only alive but have been growing immensely. I personally didn't get into VRC until mid-last year, when I got my hands on an Oculus Rift S thanks to my good friends Aaron and Cody. My initial expectations for the aviation worlds was low, mostly because I knew that VRC was not built with vehicles or aircraft in mind. I could not have been more wrong with my expectations. I could have never anticipated what awaited me. Note: Thanks to VTail for aiding with most of the screenshots present in this article! AN UNEXPECTEDLY GOOD EXPERIENCE Instead of broken planes and barely flyable machines, I found an impressively well developed flight system. I was extremely surprised at how intuitive the controls were, since they utilized the VR controllers and their position in relation to a relative zero to emulate a flight stick and throttle. The rest of the actions (gear, flaps, missiles, guns, etc.) were performed using action wheels, akin to the ones you would see on console titles, which you controlled with the joysticks on the controller. It was a great experience. Like many, my first experience with these planes and the system that drives them was in the showcase world made by the creator of this flight system, Test Pilots. Made by Sacchan, who we have interviewed previously, this world showcases the SaccFlight system that he created with a variety of aircraft that were modeled either by him or Sagi-chan. These aircraft are extremely fun to fly, which is evident by the amount of people that have favorited the world surpassing +185,000 as of the time of writing, with a visit count in the 3.8 Million range. An absolutely impressive amount that I was not expecting from an aviation world. This is where things get interesting. Since Sacchan's pre-fab is public, this has led to a flood of creators to hop onto the aviation train. This is the aspect that interests me the most about VRC Aviation: Its community. THE COMMUNITY For a socially-focused game like VRC, it is only natural that communities will be formed. Since the start, there have been several communities within VRC Aviation that have dedicated themselves to creating content. For the most part these communities are English-speaking, with the second largest cluster being the Japanese-speaking ones. From the extremely serious Japanese VRC Flight Academy to less serious worlds that let people just fly together and relax, the amount of worlds is absolutely mind-blowing. It has been a blast being around people from South East Asia, Europe, India, Africa and the Americas, mostly when all of us share this passion for aviation, to a certain degree. I have spent most of my time in VRC with some of the independent creators and users as well as with a lot of the members/admins from the VRC Black Aces, one of the biggest communities currently in VRC Aviation. They are an interesting bunch to hang around, since many of the admins are involved in world creation themselves. There is always something going on. Be it someone needing testers for their new aircraft or someone that needs to verify that a new feature works as intended. These are almost daily occurrences. Of all these creators, there are a some with whom I interact with more. Riko and NON (both being the Black Aces head admins), Zweikaku, Erika, Zhakami Zhako, Ahri, Raptoritasha, VTail (the one who generously provided most of the screenshots used in this article), Sagi-chan, Uni Power and even Sacchan himself. There are more, of course, I most probably missed a couple of people here. Not everyone mentioned above is from the Black Aces, keep that in mind. As to the Black Aces, just like other communities before them, have been organizing events and get-togethers. This is an aspect of VRC that I was already familiar with as some of my earlier exposures to VRC Aviation prior to my direct involvement with the community were through these events, as I did attend a couple alongside Aaron and Cody. EVENTS, AIRSHOWS AND TOURNAMENTS This is, to me, the most exciting part about VRC Aviation and the one that differentiates it from any other virtual aviation experience out there. It combines the social aspects of VRChat with aviation in just the right ways to form an experience that you cannot get anywhere else. Be this a free-for-all dogfighting event, a full-on airshow or a ranked tournament. I have never seen a place where you can have this much direct interaction with participants and other community members. I suspect that this is due to the immersion and depth that VR brings. There are other games with similar events and communities, one of these being DCS World. But DCS airshows are presented on livestream format by big communities, forcing you to only witness it from the ground as if you were watching an actual airshow from your TV. In VRChat, this is not the case. Aside from the 80 person per instance limit, everyone is welcome to join the Black Aces airshows and events. As a spectator, these shows are a blast. You get to see some rare aircraft that you can only see in the virtual realm, as they no longer fly or have been destroyed. You also get to see them up-close and personal as the real life airshow restrictions are nothing but a joke in VRC. Extremely low passes at supersonic speed, tandem cobra maneuvers in front of the audience and some pretty unique formations. All of that while in VR, giving you a sense of depth that you can only get with that block of plastic strapped to your head. I have participated as a pilot in two of these airshows and all I can say is that this is the only experience that has motivated me to learn more aerobatic flying. You can see me above flying as number 3 in that 5-man formation doing the break. That event was a blast for me, as we rushed practice since I was only a back-up pilot for that position until the actual person was unable to fly that day. I got an intensive course, got accustomed to the routine and everything went as planned. The other occasion was a bit more special for me, though. I got to fly the An-225 only a couple of days after it was confirmed as destroyed during the ongoing Ukrainian-Russo War. We wanted to honor the memory of that giant of aviation and what better way to do it than letting people have a look at how it would have been to have that aircraft fly overhead. I planned out the route for the final pass as that is when we wanted people to see the Mriya. As I was the center of attention, I got to fly as flight-lead for that formation. I was immensely excited and nervous since I had one shot to get it right. You can see the results below: This brings us to the tournaments. I never expected to see a competitive scene rise in VRChat. Yet, here we are. Several communities arrange and regulate independent tournaments. The ones I follow the most are the ones that the Black Aces organize. They started small, with only 20 or so people signing up for their events but have grown exponentially since then. The last two tournaments have been particularly big for VRChat, which even forced the organizers to split the participants in elimination brackets divided by block. This was due to having 80 or so participants per event, which would break any sort of acceptable experience due to performance reasons. They have livestreamed these events to their YouTube channel. They are particularly exciting and surprisingly well organized, even if there are a couple of hick-ups here and there behind the scenes. I even participated as one of the commentators for last tournament's finals. It was an exciting event with lots of impressive maneuvers performed by the participants. Here's a couple of shots from the last two tournaments, which had F-14Ds and MiG-29As respectively. Additionally, I designed the tournament liveries! MY PERSPECTIVE For me, this community has been a breath of fresh air. I mostly come from the DCS World side of things, where elitism is not only prevalent but just an inherent part of the community, as I stated in my last article about letting yourself love your own play-style. It is one of the reasons why I do not really interact with the greater DCS community. In VRC, specifically the creator side of things, I expected much of the same. I couldn't have been more wrong. People are constantly helping others out, sharing their code and experience because they want this community to grow and learn. No one here is doing anything for money, everyone is here because this is a passion of theirs. They have even motivated me to start learning Blender and take up VRChat world development. I have actively pursued the first part by starting to model an aircraft that my friend, Hueman, and I have been designing for quite a while now. It's Hue's original design with my take on several aspects, but it will be ready and flying in a Skyward-themed world at some point in this year. That is the plane model you see above, which is the state of the asset as of the time of writing. This community has been unexpectedly welcoming. In fact, the word "unexpected" can be used to describe most of my experience in VRC Aviation so far. I cannot wait to see what these guys make in the future, as everything I have seen until now has been nothing but impressive. Fly skyward and fly safe. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

There are only a couple of people whose work has made me reconsider what was possible in a game. One of these people would be Zhakami Zhako, an indie developer who basically redefined the way I looked at VRChat (VRC) world development. We had the chance to talk to him about his development endeavors in VRC, the systems he has developed and what his plans are for Project Fairy, the Yukikaze fan-game he has been developing in VRC for the past two years. How has he developed what can be summarized as a full-on desktop-compatible indie game inside of another game? Let's find out! First off, we’d like to thank you for accepting our interview request. Could you start by introducing yourself and telling us a bit about what you do? Hello. I’m Kim S., also known as “Zhakami Zhako”. I’m just a programmer with some odd… habits. I do programming stuff, as well as home door-to-door PC maintenance and Unity in my free time. What is your background as a software developer? Anything you would consider noteworthy? I’m a graduate of Bachelor of Science in Information Technology, and basically been with the industry for 4 years and counting. Currently I’m working with my second company and I’ve been developing Web-based apps (like React.JS, Vue.JS), API servers (involving Spring-boot, Node.JS), mobile apps that’s usually based on Javascript (AKA React-Native & Native-Script) and microcontroller related systems (like Arduino). I would probably say that the fact we’ve released two games (just very simple ones), built a wallet system, as well as a job finder app and a catalogue app which has been quite an achievement for me. How and when did you get into VRChat? Were you always interested in creating content for VRC or did something motivate you to do it? It was back then around 2020 when the COVID pandemic arrived and we were stuck at our homes doing nothing. Although I’m not that sociable, I always wanted to try out VRChat to try and meet new and all kinds of people. It was quite sluggish at first; trying to blend in, finding your first preferable avatar and like real life, trying to find your group. After a while, I met a couple of people (HolyKnightAD) who introduced me to Sacchan. At the time, Sacchan was working with his first few iterations of his flight System, SaccFlight. At first you can only fly arcade style with basic controls like Roll, Pitch, Yaw using the left and right analog sticks (Or WASD on desktop) and holding down Trigger (or shift) to control the throttle plus you didn’t have health nor gun damage. Even at the early state of the system at the time, it mesmerized me. I never thought that this kind of content creation was possible in VRChat; let alone programming something like this in VRC. After a while, a few friends (HolyKnightAD and Zweikaku, VRC World Creators) started making their own aircraft worlds. That made me think: ‘If I make my own aircraft world… It has to be a bit different.’ So I chose Yukikaze as a theme. I started researching how to get models, if there are free models, and how to extract things. It made me start learning how to use Autodesk 3ds Max, Blender, Unity, even hex editing just to get certain contents from the main game itself. Ever since then… I’ve been somewhat competitive but never properly released worlds. But here I am right now. You are quite the fan of Yukikaze, the sci-fi aviation book and anime series. How did you get into the series and what would you consider to be the best entry point for someone trying to get into it? Back then when I first encountered Yukikaze, it was just a random game that I found on the internet. I gave it a try and “holy crap, I love the Super Sylph”. Albeit the game felt rushed, there was something in me that kept telling myself “Man, the game feels rushed or unfinished. I wonder what if it had more.” I started to look for everything that’s related to the game. I saw that the anime actually exists; I’ve watched it for the action scenes (since I was a kid back then) but there were some things that I couldn’t understand. It would depend on one’s preferences. Starting from the anime then to the books has some sort of a different impact compared to reading the books then watching the anime. I’m pretty sure some people who have read the books then finding out that an anime of it exists definitely would make people feel excited about it and try to expect things like what happened on the book to be in the anime. Whereas watching the anime first, then reading the book would give you a different approach like... finding out why this happened in detail, what happened further in detail and what were the thoughts of each character when this and that happened... as well as being surprised when the anime had a different interpretation and delivering a different outcome compared to the book. Personally, I have a different impression since the order for me was playing the game first, watching the anime, then reading the books. I had zero idea of what Yukikaze was all about, zero knowledge of Japanese (since the game was 100% in the Japanese language) and used context clues in order to interpret what was happening around the game. Then I watched the anime and understanding what was happening, and ‘extending’ further on what happened after the last mission of the game, then reading the book to see more in depth details of what exactly is happening inside the crazy world of Faery. It even surprised me that the DACT mission of the game between the player and the Fand-II had further interesting scenes that happened in the book, and never was shown in both the anime and the game. As well as what happened to the “Public Information” mission where Fukai and Randy got themselves into a different dimension of a JAM area, (*spoiler alert, Randy lost his arm*) (P.S. I don’t find the interaction between Maj. James Bukhar and Lt. Fukai as gay when i first watched the anime as to how others interpreted it. I find them as buddies taking too much care of each other) I would probably like to talk about the canceled missions of the original game at some point. There were some interesting findings on unused content, unused audio files and the mission titles that I’ve found; especially “FRX99 DACT”,“ASAT”, “In Earth Air”, “Scramble”, “Operation Omega”. Your flagship project right now is Project Fairy, a Yukikaze fan-game inside of VRC. How did this project start and for how long have you been developing it? It started back in 2020 when I was developing the AI’s and the Trigger system in Project Fairy and as I went along, I kept re-watching the series again as I worked with VRC World development. When I began this project, I only wanted to create a world that has planes and free flight. But as I’ve progressed further and the more I ‘wanted’ more things in it, certain questions came popping in left and right. Like “what if I make users experience what the people in Fairy experienced when fighting the JAM?” and “can I recreate scenes from the anime?” I began by making a world that has a dialogue system (aka the trigger system) and the AI’s, which is the current public world called "Fairy Air Force". Albeit that I’ve released it, it felt like I’ve rushed it, or rather... it felt too janky. Sure, the idea was to play cooperatively by spawning AI’s around and fighting an ‘enemy’ Banshee, however... people did not seem to appreciate it at the time. And ever since then, I haven’t updated it for almost a year. Synchronization sucked at the time, networking was too janky, and it felt too heavy on performance. When that happened, I changed my perspective. I wanted to make it into a single player world. The plan back then was to make it a concept world, rather than a “first episode”. Despite being a concept world, I wanted to give it my all. I began imagining the hangar of the SAF. Lights turning on and making a dramatic entry; as based on how the anime depicted it. Then I began looking into the concept art of the anime, the concept art of the SAF underground hangar... then began modeling and texturing the hangar. Personally, I don’t have skills when it comes to modeling. I’m still learning. UI elements such as the HUD, indicators and other things were made from scratch with a mix of Photoshop and Blender. The hangar at first was meant to be some sort of a hangout or sightseeing place at first, since I did not know what to do with it. Or rather, I did not have the rest of the systems to make it work or the skills to detail things further especially the elevator. Until magically, Sagi-chan (VRChat aviation focused aircraft modeler) appeared out of nowhere, asked me for the concept art papers and ultimately gave me a very detailed hangar elevator. I’ve taken clips from the anime, mix and matched and improved the trigger system for the dialogue and extended it further. And that’s how I’ve managed to create the scene of the intro. As I progressed on this… I’ve been writing scenarios, dialogues and story for Project Fairy. This has been in development since late 2020. I have big plans for Project Fairy, but that’s not limited only for Yukikaze related content, but for SaccFlight in general as well. What is your current scope for Project Fairy? Currently, there are two missions that are being worked on. But we’ve somehow written some other missions based on the novels and the anime. Actively developed is the prologue, which is more or less a ‘feel’ of the game, then the next episode which is based on the first episode of the anime but with a mix of the interpretation of the first book. Some of the episodes that are already written are based on the first encounter of the gray sylph, the first encounter with Col. Guneau and his ‘Knights’, the canyon chase with the gray sylph, Banshee 4 examination, as well as flying with the POV of other pilots. Personally, I’m more excited about recreating the canyon chase scene in the anime. The writing is in the works, but development hasn’t started yet. The way each episode would be handled would be per world. (e.g. 1 world = 1 episode). Having multiple episodes with each world may be possible, but it can weigh down a lot in terms of world size (megabytes) and performance hits (the amount of scripts!) Aside from Project Fairy, you have developed several sub-systems for SaccFlight and Unity. Could you tell us a bit about some of these systems? There were a couple of phases before I managed to make subsystems for SaccFlight, namely the arcade SaccFlight and then the new SaccFlight phase. During the early days, there were no afterburners. I had to make an afterburner module where you had to double tap your trigger (or shift) in order to enable the afterburner. HUD’s were too simple back then; I wanted to make a working HUD based on my own system. I made my own HUD system. And the thing I was most proud of during that time was the missile system. I managed to make a simple target selection, lock on, fire missiles and fire flares for countermeasures. However, this was only made available in the Fairy Air Force world during the early days of SaccFlight, as it was too customized to transfer to the prefab SaccFlight system. However, to this date, I still use the same missile / weapons system that I’ve made from the early days, only then with some improvements. Old system aside, I’ve been sharing the gauges-controller that I’ve tailored for Project Fairy to the developer friends I am closest with. It’s a simple controller that translates whatever the situation of your aircraft into animation parameters and values in order for you to use, customize and apply on each of your aircraft. Basically you just input the minimum / maximum value of your gauges on each gauge type, animate the gauge according to the min/max value, and call it a day. It’s very simple to the point that most of my friends are using it now. It covers the ADI, Fuel, Speed, AOA, Altimeters, Radar Altimeter, Pull up indicators, G’s, Mach and other things. Basically if you have a model that has these kinds of gauges, you wouldn’t need to dig through programming just to make it work! AI Systems are also made. Project Fairy wouldn’t even be a solid project without the AI’s. AI scopes from stationary, to ground moving, to aircraft units. They’re very customizable to the point where you can set waypoints, set targets whether who and who not to attack, attack range, the number of weapons that it can have (like turrets, missiles, guns), the speed, flight characteristics (for the fighters!), the amount of missile salvos per minute (yes.), the time to to change between targets, as well as formation characteristics. Aside from fighter aircraft configurations, naval vessels are also possible, as well as airships. Adding multiple turrets on each AI object is also possible. A Damage System is also available. It is a little nitpicky when setting it up, however you will need to set up these fine details in order to achieve a working damage system. Basically you can have burning individual engines (up to 2 at the moment), losing wings (left and right!), and even control surfaces (flaps, ailerons, elevators, canards, etc.) Another system that I’ve made tailored specifically for Project Fairy is the dialogue system. It’s essentially one of the core components of Project Fairy in order to achieve the story mode. But, despite designing the dialogue system, I do not know how other games (like Call of Duty, Halo or Ace Combat) actually achieve their dialogue systems or event systems. It is very, very customizable and dynamic in a sense that you can call an event if an AI gets destroyed, you cross an objective, a condition is met, and other neat things to achieve a scripted event. And lastly, one of my proudest achievements so far is the system that may blow other creators' minds. A floating origin shifter system. I call it Open World Movement Logic (OWML). It’s a system that basically allows us to move further than the 40km boundary of VRChat (or perhaps Unity itself), all the way to… whatever you can imagine. Your only limit is your imagination, and ironically… Optimization. And since we’ve broken that limit… We’ve also developed a navigation system that’s just a simple TACAN navigation system. Example 02 - Example 03 The biggest and most impressive of the features that you have developed so far is the Open World Movement Logic (OWML) script for Unity. It solves some of Unity’s inherent issues with floating point precision calculations in large maps. Could you tell us a bit about how it works and what went into making it? Basically OWML works in a way or form on how origin point shifting works in theory. If you travel a specific threshold away from the center of the world space, it moves the “map” according to the area or coordinates you’ve traveled, then teleports you back to the center of the world space; thus avoiding further floating point precision errors. As this is tailored for SaccFlight, the way OWML works whenever you enter a chunk will call a synchronization fix in order to make other players synchronize seamlessly (and happens locally). OWML is not only limited for the aircrafts, it’s also tailored for the players. As you travel on foot (or SaccFlight avatar fly), it will move the map accordingly as well once you’ve entered a chunk. In order to synchronize players, we use a method where we ‘fake’ sit a player on a seat (which is called stations), but as the other player is moving around, their position also updates accordingly; thus even if you’re somewhere on the center of the world space, for the other player’s view you will be where you are supposed to be. Other games like Kerbal Space Program (I’m assuming) use a form of origin point shifting, but the execution may be a bit different. The early version of OWML that is currently in Project Fairy works in a way that it moves the world *all the time*. It activates once you’ve crossed the first waypoint or once you’ve used one of the scene selectors. The current version that’s stable and synchronizes with all the players moves the map according to the threshold. The reason that I’ve come up with the threshold instead of moving it the whole time is due to a synchronization problem with Sacchan’s Synchronization method between players, that might affect the flight physics plus the amount of extern calls (and function calls ) when you enter a chunk. However, this threshold can be customized as you set it up on your instance. In all honesty, It was only an idea that I’ve come up with, and never found out that it was actually a method or an application to a theory. Will you release the OWML script as a public prefab for Unity? If so, what are your plans for its distribution? At some point in time I will definitely release it as an extension for SaccFlight since this is tailored specifically for VRChat, VRChat’s Networking and SaccFlight itself. A general purpose use for Unity itself can be made however with some changes but the same methods can be used. There may be other systems out there in the unity store for all I know that use origin point shifting, but I barely have surfed through the asset store or other systems in unity to know. Since you are using SaccFlight for Project Fairy, will you be using all of the subsystems that you have developed to further improve the project? Definitely. Some of them will be shared publicly. As for the others, people may need to contact me as it may need further setup as most of the subsystems are tailored for my needs in Project Fairy. Why did you decide to make Project Fairy in VRChat instead of a standalone project? One reason would probably be for people’s accessibility. VRChat is free, the worlds can be publicly accessed by everyone whoever has VRChat. Another probably the built in functionalities of VRChat, like its VR Engine itself (albeit it’s still basic Unity VR, it’s already good enough). A running standalone project would be much more preferable for most people but I would say it’s like the ‘testing grounds’. If it’s a successful project, we can convert everything into a standalone project as is; as VRC is running on UdonSharp, which is a scripting engine that also uses Unity’s C#. Whenever Project Fairy reaches completion, how will people be able to access it? It will also be free to access, correct? Of course! As long as it’s in VRChat and as long as VRChat is alive. Unless, admittedly ambitious; if I am permitted to sell such a game. But that’s just wishful thinking for now. Again, this is a hobby project; I do this in my free time. About the Interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

Once upon a time, the king of DCS modules was the A-10C. It reigned supreme in terms of capability, realism and popularity. But, those times are no-more. Released in June of 2018 into early access with some controversy regarding its initial systems, the F/A-18C Hornet has surpassed the A-10C in terms of popularity and, in some regards, combat capability. The Hornet has now cemented itself as the king of the carrier deck and of DCS: World as a whole. Today, we will be taking a look at this bug and its stinger to see if it is a fit for you. As always, our review will be separated in several sections for ease of reading: External and internal 3D models Visual and sound effects Flight modelling Mission capability Armament Ease of use and learning curve Super Carrier DLC Is this aircraft for you? REVIEW FIRST POSTED: 03/20/2021 UPDATED: 5/13/2022 EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL 3D MODELS When it comes to this are the Hornet both shines like a firefly at night and also falls short in some areas. Externally, the 3D model is nothing short of gorgeous. Every rivet and every panel line has been excruciatingly represented, I do not envy the 3D modeler and the 2D artists that worked on this model as it must have been painful to go and include all this detail. That being said, their work is some of the best in-game, very lovely. Additionally, for those that also delve into texture creation like I do, this model has very nice unwrapping and only consists of two main diffuses plus a couple of additional ones for the fuel tank as usual. Livery creation for this aircraft is far easier than, let's say, the Tomcat or the Eagle. Internally, the cockpit model is more than solid. It has been lovingly crafted to the best degree possible. The only complaints that I might have are minor details, mainly the use of baked reflections and the weird/unnatural weathering patters on the Up-front Controller (UFC) and the metal panels in general (last picture in the gallery bellow). I do not know if it is only me, but they look a bit unnatural and artificial when you compare them to the ones inside of the Viper's cockpit. That being said. Texture work is magnificent and weathering, aside from the previously mentioned, is spot on. It looks like a worn-out cockpit but not one that has been leaved on disrepair. Nicely done, ED. VISUAL AND SOUND EFFECTS This is an area of constant change for the Hornet as it has gone through several sound overhauls throughout its development, as well as visual ones. At first, external sounds were rough and surprisingly underwhelming, while the visual effects have always been absolutely stunning. Visually, as of the writing of this article, the Hornet has some of the best visual effects in-game. From the water vapor that appears on the LERX while at high AoA scenarios or the subtle but very well represented win-flex that occurs at high G. These are some of the things that make the Hornet an absolute blast to fly around. She is a looker and she knows it. Afterburners looks like actual afterburners, unlike previously where they used to look a bit artificial. The effect is not perfect nor is it ever going to be, but as it stands it is the best it has ever been and clearly an improvement over what used to be. Bellow there's screenshots of both vapor effects and afterburners, check them out. As for sound, the Hornet now has very solid internal and external sounds. It used to have what some might consider "not the best" or "meh" sound design, but all of that has changed. The roar and howl of the General Electric F404 engines is there in all their glory. Something else that I consider noteworthy is the fact that the sound for the M61 Vulcan cannon has drastically changed for all aircraft that use it, including the Hornet. It used to be noticeably muffled and packed less of a punch, but with the new sound design all of that has changed. Here are some samples we recorded so you can judge it for yourself, all of them were recorded in-game and were not modified in any way. EXAMPLES: Fly-by at around 450Kts, full military power: (Volume Warning) Various in-cockpit sounds (engine throttle, gun firing, annunciator): FLIGHT MODELING This is always a tough category, as like with any other aircraft, there is a lot to take into consideration other than just the feel of the flight model. This category is the most subjective one in this article as I do not have any real world experience with this craft. I will only base my opinion on practical experience and knowledge of practical aerodynamics and the theoretical behavior that a Hornet should have under certain scenarios. That being said, the Hornet does feel real enough for me to believe its depiction in the simulator. It behaves just like what I have read and seen on publicly available information. First, It has absolutely mind-blowingly good nose authority at high-AoA which lets it perform excellently in a dogfight. She can maintain energy really well thanks to the high thrust to weight ratio that it has, which comes in handy in fighting contemporary adversaries such as the Fulcrum or the Flanker. The behavior of the Flight Control System (FCS) is, however, another one of those things that I can only talk about subjectively. The FCS does seem to be less restrictive than on contemporary aircraft such as the F-16CM, with the ability to do what I would consider riskier maneuvers without the FCS trying to over correct or compensate. The aircraft will always try to keep itself aloft and will also limit the amount of Gs you can pull as required by the load on the pylons. You do have the ability to override some of those limitations with the push of a button, but there is no such thing as a "FCS OFF" button. To me, the Hornet is one of the best handling aircraft currently in the simulator, both for veteran and rookie pilots alike. It will let you be aggressive when you need and it will help you when possible to avoid dying by your own mishandling, even if it means restricting some of your inputs. She is just a blast! MISSION CAPABILITIES If there is a single aircraft in DCS that truly is a representative of the power of a multi-role fighter, it is the Hornet. This is the aircraft that defined modern multirole capabilities, with its ability to perform multiple mission types at once without compromising on any being unparalleled as of the time of writing this review, with the only aircraft that come close being the Viper and the JF-17 or Jeff, as it has been lovingly named by the community. The Hornet is a fully fledged multirole 4th generation aircraft. At the touch of a button it can shift between anti-air and anti-surface operations with its radar automatically switched to the appropriate mode. The radar is powerful enough to provide scans of terrain that can be used for navigation and targeting while also being able to fire upon up to 8 air targets within seconds. It has systems that share target data with other Hornets in the flight, access to the best data link DCS has available and its detailed helmet mounted display allows it to maintain impressive situational awareness. The three screens in the cockpit allow for quick selection and display of multiple systems at once, rather than having to pick and choose a single system they want to focus on. Anti-ship, anti-air, air-to-ground, SEAD, CAS, Precision strikes, recon, COIN, etc. Every single mission type is possible with the Hornet; and thanks to its ability to do air to air refueling, it can do all of them far away from its home at sea or ground. Additionally, its capability to communicate with other aircraft through data link makes joint attacks a breeze, even more when smart weapons are being used. Nothing beats the feeling of sending a swarm of JSOWs in-land to strike a SAM site while a buddy is backing you up with HARMs. It is able to perform any kind of task you can imagine, with the exception of satellite intercepts. Those are only for the Eagle. ARMAMENT M61 VULCAN 20MM CANNON 578 rounds of pure destruction. The Vulcan has a particular quirk in this aircraft, its angle. It is angled 5° upwards as this allows for air to air benefits when on a dogfight; that is all great and dandy until you get to strafing a ground target. You will find yourself slightly pitching down to position the target, but that shouldn't be an issue as you have a very accurate radar guided pipper. This cannon is just fun, what can I say? AIM-9 SIDEWINDER The companion that will never disappoint. This missile will act the way you expect it, but they are a lot more interesting to use due to the Joint Helmet Mounted Cueing System (JHMCS). The JHMCS is wonderful to use with the more modern variants of the Sidewinder available to you, the 9X. With that combo, you get up to 180° of off-boresight capabilities! You have three variants available: AIM-9L AIM-9M AIM-9X AIM-7 SPARROW This will be your Fox-1 type missile. Do not underestimate this missile just because it lacks internal guidance, it can be just as capable as any other missile in the battlefield if employed correctly. You have three variants available as of the writing of this article: AIM-7F AIM-7M AIM-7MH AIM-120 AMRAAM One of the best Fox-3 type missiles right now. Long range, self-guidance and maneuverability make this missile a lethal weapon. The best (or worst, depending on your opinion) part is that you can carry as many as 10 of these on a full air to air loadout. You have two variants available: AIM-120B AIM-120C UNGUIDED ROCKETS If what you need is volume of fire and you have great trust in your aim, these are it. Nothing more to be said, to be honest. You have two main rocket variants available: 2.75' HYDRA rockets available on both LAU-61 and LAU-68 pods. ZUNI rockets on LAU-10 pods. UNGUIDED BOMBS Good ol' iron bombs. They come in all shapes and sizes, not only limited to only irons. Here is what you have as your selection: Mk.80 series bombs (Mk.82 on all of its low and high drag variants, Mk.83 and Mk.84) CBU-99 Clusters Mk.20 Rockeyes BDU Practice bombs GUIDED BOMBS My personal favorites, these bombs will hit hard and hit right on target. You have a very decent selection, including a much modern bomb that was added recently and a particularly cool yet kind of unjustifiable optically guided glide bomb! Laser guided GBU series: Old Paveways such as GBU-10, 12, 16 and the much more recent GBU-24 Paveway III. GPS/INS guided GBU series: GBU-31 and GBU-38 Last but not least, the AGM-62 Walleye, an optically guided precision guide bomb that allows man-in-the-loop guidance. Old but somewhat capable! AGM-154 JOINT STAND OFF WEAPON (JSOW) One of the most versatile weapons in the Hornet's arsenal. It comes with both a cluster (A variant) and bunker buster (C variant) warheads. These have the capability to glide on-target from a long ways away, as long as you give them the impulse they need. They can be programmed with their own approach vectors, burst heights and approach speeds as necessary. They are fun little bastards, you can carry up to 8 of them. AGM-84 HARPOON AND SLAM MISSILES Although both missiles use the same "base", they are completely different. The AGM-84D "Harpoon" is an anti-ship radar-guided missile capable of destroying even the mightiest of vessels, you can see them in action on the Mission Capability section of this review and above, being launched. The AGM-84E, on the other hand, is a Stand-off Land Attack Missile. It is guided by INS into a target with GPS coordinates. The SLAM and its range extended variant, the AGM-84H SLAM-ER can also be manually steered into a target. At a designated range from target, the missile transmits a video feed from its WALLEYE camera to the Hornet for target correction. You, as the pilot, directly control the missile's flight path during the last approach to target with the aid of the AWW-13 DATALINK POD, as seen in the picture bellow. This is called a man-in-the-loop system. AGM-88 HIGH-SPEED ANTI-RADIATION MISSILE The best Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAD) weapon in the simulator. Period. With firing modes for self protection, seeking out emitting SAM radars and pre-emptively lobbing HARMs to catch them off guard. It's easy to deploy, precise and deadly. All you need to know to fall in love with it. AGM-65 MAVERICK Mavericks are always a welcomed weapon. Although, the Hornet can only have 4 at a time, so it is limited when it comes to time on station. It has two variants: AGM-65F (INFRARED) AGM-65E (LASER) AN/AAQ-28 LITENING POD One of the best sensor pods you can get, the LITENING provides incredible precision and impressive optical capabilities to aid in getting those guided munitions where they need to go. Equipped with both air to air and air to ground modes, it can also track everything than moves and even more. AN/ASQ-228 ATFLIR Functionally pretty similar to the LITENING, the ATFLIR is the second targeting pod which can be used by the Hornet. It operates in a similar way to the LITENING but with some differences in the display layout, controls, targeting and track logic, etc. Additionally, this is the only naval operations qualified targeting pod; meaning that if you want to go for full realism while deploying from a boat, this is your only choice. Practically, this limitation is not modeled in-game so it is up to you to choose which of these two TGPs serves you best. EASE OF USE AND LEARNING CURVE There is a reason why I have recommended this plane to all my friends who have wanted to try DCS out ever since the Hornet came out. It is the most modern aircraft that also has the smoothest learning curve out of every jet in DCS, period. The aircraft's controls are intuitive and easy to map, even on simpler HOTAS systems with less buttons or hat switches. Impressively, the most capable aircraft in-game is also the one that is the easiest to use to its fullest with the least amount of buttons possible even when you take into consideration the sheer amount of things you can do in this aircraft. After updates in April 2022, its navigation systems are now so advanced that players who set up navigation correctly are able to utilize the Hornet’s automation. The Hornet is able to use automatic throttle control and couple its autopilot to waypoints and TACAN to fly itself without pilot inputs. With the automated carrier landing system the Hornet can essentially land itself back on an aircraft carrier with minimal inputs from the pilot. Additionally, the aircraft comes with a very detailed manual that has been kept up to date with every update that the module has had over the past three years. If that is not enough for you, then both Matt Wagner's official videos and the included training missions can get you up and running. My only gripe with the training missions is that there are none for some of the newer systems, which would be a very welcomed addition of development time permits. THE SUPER CARRIER DLC MODULE It feels kind of weird to talk about another module while reviewing another, but in this case it is completely unavoidable. These two module are like two peas in a pod, they were meant for each other. But that does not mean everything about this relationship is perfect. I have one gripe with the Super Carrier, its price. I know that development costs need to be paid and that there is more to the Super Carrier than just a pretty model. The LSO stations are awesome to use and offer a certain kind of experience that the diehard fans crave for, I get it because I have used them and they are pretty amazing. The deck crew is wonderfully modeled and animated as well, adding to the immersion factor when flying the Hornet from the ship. But in my honest opinion the price is too high, even more when taking in consideration the fact that the vanilla CVN-74 has an incorrectly sized bow which causes Tomcats to hit their wing tips at launch from catapults 1 and 2. This module should have come as an included bonus for everyone that buys the Hornet, Tomcat or the future Intruder: even when the team that developed the latter two is also making a Forrestal-class carrier that will be added to the base game assets for everyone to use. If the user doesn't own the Hornet but wants the Super Carrier, then the base price should be half of what it currently is. I am aware that if you own the Hornet you get a permanent discount on the Super Carrier, but it is not enough. Even more when you consider the base price of the Hornet and not its price at discount during sales. I am not a game developer (yet) and I might have said something that is completely wrong from a gamedev standpoint, but as a consumer it is a bit hard to justify the price tag. I love Eagle Dynamics and what they do, they have shown great dedication too keeping this simulator alive with constant patches and module releases and supporting their effort is enough reason for some to buy the carrier. Ultimately the decision of buying the Super Carrier module is up to you, the reader. Take into consideration the points I mentioned previously. IS THIS AIRCRAFT FOR YOU? If what you want in a module is: An amazing weapon platform. An excellent flight model that is fun from 0 kts to Mach 1.2. To be able to fill almost every role on a mission. To carry 10 AMRAAMs and lob them in disrespect towards your enemies. A lovingly crafted cockpit model that, despite its flaws, makes you feel like you are there. If you don't mind: The ridiculously simple learning curve. The hand-holding behavior that the FCS has sometimes. To be bored because you can do everything with just one plane. Being able to launch AMRAAMs from 50 miles away and kill a fly. If all or some of the above is what you want, then Eagle Dynamics' F/A-18C Hornet is for you. About the writer: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as the co-founder and writer ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

When you search for DCS content on YouTube, or almost any other video sharing platform, most of what you will find are videos of 4th generation fighters ripping the skies apart at supersonic speeds, launching guided air to air and air to ground ammunitions from thirty thousand feet in the air. While I do enjoy doing just with the Viper and all of my other modern fighters, there is something I have been doing even more: low level ops. NEW STYLE, NEW STRATEGIES Low level combat flying with challenging aircraft is something I enjoy greatly. It makes you be much more aware of your surroundings and forces you to plan your missions in advance. You do not only have to know exactly what your target is but also the route you will be taking since terrain will actually affect the way in which you will navigate. It presents a completely different set of challenges which I find extremely delightful. Light Anti Air Artillery (AAA) is a legitimate threat no matter what you are flying, rotary wing or otherwise. You will be forced to scout from a distance at low level to increase your chances of survival during your attack run. Using terrain as cover is by far the best strategy to avoid them. You will have to stay fast and maneuverable. You never know what could lurking be in that area of operations. Low level operations are some of the only ways to use a more diverse set of aircraft. It is the only way in which I have been able to adapt the Super Tucano mod to our regular missions which were never designed with these slow turboprops. I like to stay low to avoid the long range radars that might still be active, wiping down minor threats and strategic objectives. The same applies for my rotary wings. I usually enjoy wiping down air defenses and convoys with the Mi-24P Hind using its Anti-Tank Guided Missiles (ATGMs) and the 30mm cannon. Getting low and fast with the Hind is extremely fun, which is something that applies to all of the other rotary wing aircraft that I use in DCS. They make the game feel much more alive for me, even more in a time where I feel like everyone in the game is awaiting new modules to arrive. Low level infiltrations to attack as strategic target and leave as fast as you arrived are where the situations in which helos will shine their best. You can also just sit just behind terrain and lob ATGMs at the enemy so that, when they inevitably fire at your position, you can hide as fast as possible. Then reset your attack behind a new piece of cover and try again. Does that mean that low-level insertions are restricted to only helicopters? Of course not! I have had some of my best infiltrations while flying a Viggen. Low level gets a lot more dangerous at those higher speeds but the Viggen is the king of supersonic low level operations. It was designed to do well in those environments. Mavericks, bombs, rockets and even anti-ship missiles. All of which are better employed while staying low and fast. If you find yourself ever wondering how can you spice your DCS World experience, give low level ops a try. It is going to be more challenging but I assure you that it is worth it. Do remember that these types of ops only work for certain mission types, so adapt to the missions. Increasing one's skill set is always something worthwhile. About the author: Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034

One area which has always been of interest for us is the graceful world of virtual airshows. In the past we have followed these interests by talking to our friends over at the Frecce Tricolori Virtuali (FTV) and with their spokesperson and our friend, Duke. It has been quite a while since we had those interviews with the FTV, so we decided to contact another excellent Digital Combat Simulator World virtual demonstration team who has been making quite the name for themselves lately: Virtual Team60. We contacted the leader of the Virtual Team 60, Fredrik "Breadmaker" and asked him if he would discuss how the virtual aerobatic teams works, what their story is and a bit about the aircraft they fly. I personally extend my thanks to Fredrik for allowing us to have this interview with us. This is part one of two of this interview. Next time we will be talking with Fredrik about the Saab Sk.60 project for DCS World! First off, we’d like to thank you for agreeing to have this interview with us. Could you start by introducing yourself and telling us a bit about what you do? Thanks for having me! My name is Fredrik, callsign Breadmaker, and I’m a guy from Sweden who has had an interest in aviation in general and military aviation specifically since I was a kid. When I was young my dream was to become a fighter pilot, but life took another path so that didn’t happen. So I was quite happy when I discovered DCS a couple of years ago. Of course I had to fly the Viggen since that’s one of the most recognizable Swedish military aircraft ever. After having flown military type of missions for a while I also discovered that there are people doing close formation flights and airshow replications, and that really caught my interest. First I started doing formation flights with a few friends, and a little bit later I joined the Virtual Al Fursan as the number 7 pilot. That team ended up falling apart unfortunately so I was left without a team to fly with, but I still wanted to do it. What was the motivation for forming Team60? Around the same time as the Virtual Al Fursan had fallen apart I had started talking to a few friends about trying to make an SK60 mod for DCS. At first it was just a crazy idea, but we soon realized we were actually going to be able to make it and that’s when the idea of forming a Virtual Team 60 came to life. For Swedish aviation enthusiast, the real Team 60 certainly has a special place in their hearts. Unfortunately the team isn’t active anymore. But when they were, and especially at their peak, they were one of the most recognizable display teams in the world. So to have the opportunity to pay homage to the work they’ve done in a virtual environment felt like something we just had to do. For how long has the team been active and in which shows have you performed? The team started in the summer last year (2021). It took a while to nail down the final team lineup, but in August we had all six members in place and started doing regular practice sessions (once a week). At first we needed to just get to know each other and figure out who was going to fly what position, but when we had achieved that we started looking at our first program to learn. We decided to try and replicate the program the real team made on the Swedish Airforce annual airshow in 2018. We felt like the difficulty of that show was on a level that would be a good enough challenge for us. After having practiced it a bit we decided to sign up for our first show – the Virtual International Air Festival which was held in December of 2021. So far that’s the only show we’ve done but we’re currently working hard on preparing for the next one. 😊 Team60 seems to be extremely passionate about what they do. What is the current composition of the team? Yes indeed we are! When we started the team, none of us had much experience in flying in a virtual display group before. One of the guys didn’t even have a computer when we first got in contact. So everyone has really been a key part in building the team from the ground up and we have been working hard together to not only get better as individuals, but as a whole unit. And I really think the hard work has paid off. If you knew how it looked when we first flew and compare it to how it is not, the progress is just amazing. I’m super proud of the guys in the team! The current active flying members of the team is as follows: #1: Fredrik (Breadmaker) Elm – Team Captain and founder. Also leads the SK60 development team. #2: Ola (Bulletproof) Rådeström – Flies inner right wing Diamond formation #3: Nino (Propilot) Glad – Flies inner left wing in the Diamond formation #4: Kalle (Bobcat) Dådring – Flies slot in the Diamond formation #5: Casper (Ghost) Nilsson – Flies outer left wing in the Diamond formation & solo #6 Tim (Jugg) Jansson – Flies outer right wing in the Diamond formation & lead solo Besides these guys we also have a few “reserve” pilots who sometimes fill in during practice sessions if one of the regular members can’t fly that day and also some other “crew” members which aren’t as clearly defined. The Virtual Team 60 is also functioning as testers for the SK60 mod developers so some guys who aren’t necessarily flying with us during our training are also in a sense a part of the team, but have a more technical role. How closely does the team follow the routines of the real Team60? We try to follow them as close as we can. We’re actually in pretty close contact with a few of the old pilots from the real team who have been helping us out tremendously. Mostly we study what ever material we can find on the internet (Youtube videos mostly) to try and get an understanding of how the team flew their displays. But we also get first hand information from the pilots which provides a whole lot more detail regarding how the maneuvers are performed and what you need to think about and so on. We’re really trying hard to pay as much tribute as we can to the real Team 60 so to have their support means the world to us! Has the virtual Team60 been in contact with members of the real Team60? If so, in which aspects have they helped the virtual counterpart? As I said in the last question, yes we have! We actually met a few of them a couple of weeks ago and let them fly a bit on our computers. It was an AMAZING experience to be able to connect with them in that way. One of the founding members sent us a really encouraging message after we met them which is something that we in the Virtual Team 60 are going to carry with us with humility and pride for a very long time. How do you guys tackle training for the air show season? Do you run over the entire routine from the start in each training session or are maneuvers practiced individually? We have scheduled practice sessions every Monday night. But then it varies a bit depending on what time of the year it is and how soon it is to the next show. Currently, for example, it’s summer here in Sweden so we’re not focusing quite as hard on practicing super seriously every week. Most of us have families and so on that also need their fair share of time, and especially during summer it can be hard to put aside the time to fly in DCS every week. Those of us who aren’t occupied with anything else though try to meet up and do at least some type of flying as often as we can so we don’t loose our form completely. We have a routine that we’re practicing for the next show and if all pilots can fly during a session we most often run through that show – even if it’s a bit more laid back at the moment. When fall comes though we’re going to be more focused and strategic about nailing down the details. I think this gives us a good balance between seriousness and fun. I truly believe that when you’re doing something like this in your spare time you can’t be too serious about it (unless everyone agrees on that of course…). For us it’s important that we have fun together. One the one hand I think all of the team would agree that part of what makes it fun is the feeling of making progress and seeing that it actually looks good when we fly, and that takes a fair bit of dedication, but it always needs to be balanced so it still feels like a hobby and not a job. Does the team have any trainees at the moment? What would you recommend someone who would like to join your team? Not at the moment. Since we only started last year the Team is pretty fresh still. All of the guys are very dedicated and show no sign of stopping. My standpoint as the Leader of the team is that if someone has a place in the team and they want to keep it, it’s theirs. All of us are very well understood in what it means to have an active spot and understand what’s required to keep that spot and be a valuable part of the team. So no, there are no trainees and currently no openings. If that changes in the future, we’ll let people know. 😊 What are some memorable airshows the team has flown in the past? Are there any you'd suggest for new viewers to watch first? Well... We have only flew one so I’d suggest you go look at that one. It isn’t perfect by any means but if you take into consideration that we did our first ever practice session in August of 2021 and then flew that show in December the same year I think you could at least say we did a pretty decent job. The video can be found below: Which would you consider to be the most complex maneuver which has been performed during one of your shows? We have a maneuver in the show we’re working on now which is a bit tricky. Pilots #1 - #4 has just done a flyby and are heading out a bit from the airfield to let the Solos do one of their maneuvers. After a few seconds we turn back in and while approaching the airfield I have to roll upside down while still flying level (so the guys who fly off me won’t get lost). As soon as I’m inverted, #2 & #3 also goes inverted. #4 flies in slot behind me and #2 and #3 flies off of his wing. We then do a flyby over the runway like this before rolling back out and changing to a right echelon formation. What makes it really tricky is that it needs to happen very fast but very controlled. If anyone messes up it’s gonna look bad when we pass the crowd. Another tricky one is the “Sandwich roll” that the Solos do. They fly toward the display line, #5 rolls over and flies inverted, #6 joins and flies right underneath him. When passing the runway threshold, they put their smoke on and do a barrel roll in this formation. It’s awesome! Just like many airshow teams in DCS, Team60 has developed their own aircraft. How much influence has the aerobatic had in the development of the Sk60? That’s correct! I’d say it has had a very big impact. Getting the flight model correct and the visual appearance has been super important in allowing us to replicate the real team’s maneuvers. The mod isn’t actually going to be strictly Team 60 though. We’re also giving it some light attack and trainer capabilities before we’re going to release it to the public. There are some parts of it that will be exclusive to the Virtual Team 60 though, but I won’t tell you what. 😊 When flying the Sk.60 in airshows, what are some of its notable flight characteristics? Since the SK60 is a trainer aircraft it’s very stable in the air. This is a good thing when doing the big formations as it provides a very smooth flying experience. It’s a bit tricky though when we need to do some more “aggressive” maneuvers. For example, the roll rate isn’t super fast. Especially if you fly below 300kts and in some cases that can be tricky. But if you learn how to treat the aircraft in those situations you can still do it. This is one of the moments where the feedback and input from the real pilots are super helpful! They can tell us how they actually used to do it, which removes the guesswork for us. Does the Sk.60's side-by-side two-seat configuration have any impact on formation references when flying with multiple aircraft? Not very much. Of course, it’s going to differ a little bit depending on whether you fly right wing or left wing. But it’s hardly noticeable. I’d say it’s most apparent when you’re flying slot since you can’t place your head directly behind the tail of the aircraft in front of you but you have to be a little bit to the side. It’s also noticeable for me who flies in the front of the whole formation. If I look out to my left I can clearly see #3 and #5 just below my wing. If I look to the right though there’s half a cockpit in the way. That will be it, thank you so much for answering our interview! Is there anything else you would like to add before we conclude? Thank you! Hope you found what I had to share interesting! If you want to know more about us and just get in touch with us in general – feel free to join our Discord server. Thanks for your time! About the Interviewer Santiago "Cubeboy" Cuberos Longtime aviation fanatic with particular preference towards military aviation and its history. Said interests date back to the early 2000's leading into his livelong dive into civil and combat flight simulators. He has been involved in a few communities but only started being active around the mid 2010's. Joined as a Spanish to English translator in 2017, he has been active as a writer and the co-founder of Skyward ever since. Twitter | Discord: Cubeboy #9034