GrinchWSLG

Wow, so its one of the three games you can play on a Mac, great. Give me a break, Apple products are even larger ripoffs then Microsoft. Just look at the idiocy of the ipods and iphones. Not to mention its an OS made for people who can't handle computers. Yes its sad to see MSFS and even Trainsim 2 disappear, but that's the way things are. Everyone is laying off, its not just Microsoft. It may be a choice of lay off teams now and pick up the pieces later, or keep everyone and disappear forever. Before you whine and gripe about a mere game try and think of all folks losing their jobs in the real aviation industry. 10,000 or so at Boeing, 3,000+ at Cessna and so on. Instead of blaming Microsoft, blame the greedy banks, investors, and self image obsessed idiots that ran this country into the ground. And hope like hell we can dig ourselves out. My county just hit 15.3% unemployment, my family's company that would have been in business 50 years this year has declared bankruptcy and is now all but gone, our local air show is canceled because they can't afford it this year due to lack of sponsorships. I can feel for Microsoft, its hard times, and its going to get a lot harder before it gets better.

Booth was born in 1838, not 39. He was born and grew up in Maryland. He supported the South in the Civil War but was by no means a southerner. He also hid in a barn, not a warehouse. Lyndon Johnson wasn't a southerner, he was a Texan. Other than that the other crap looks to be mostly true. It helps that election years are always 2 or 4 years apart, so the rate of coincidence is pretty high. Yeah, definitely Tin Foil Hat material.

Well, I had a read and I must say this fellow is the exact sort of gamer (yes gamer, they are games) that has nearly killed flight siming. They set the standards and bars so high that attempts by newcomers that have real lives and aren't willing to devote their nights to memorizing the exact operating procedures for a specific system will fall short for obvious reasons of disinterest. It also breeds a sort of elitism that is so vile I can't even utter the name Falcon 4 without making is sound like a curse word. In comparison we have the community here. We have all types of gamers and fans here. Veterans, active duty, kids with aspirations, grown up kids, normal gamers. And I have never seen anyone on her has vapid and horrid as that Stiglr fellow. We promote the sim, we make it better, we make it bigger, we increase the accuracy, we dream with it, and we're accepting to newcomers. Its like night and day compared to those serious "simulation" communities. And I wouldn't rather be anywhere else.

Used to go to this race when I was in college down there. That and the Grand Am race the day before. I really miss events like this for getting out and taking pictures. http://www.flickr.com/photos/thepirateking...57594501978263/ Some pictures I took in 2007 of the Grand Am and the Rolex.

Awesome, can't wait to get my mits on'em.

I agree, definitely going to install this for my first SF2 merc campaign. Will have to do some repaints first, is there a paint kit?

There's info on the school website about program course requisites. I'm sure they'd be more than happy to send you any info you request. Just beware the standard school propaganda, its pretty bad on the bulls**t.

Well, I'm not sure what your plans are but I'll try to answer anyway. Yes AeroSci does give a bachelor of science. Hell I even got a BS and I'm Air Traffic Management. Doing AE and flying would be a lot of work IMO. I roomed with engineers for 3 years and the engineering program alone kept them damn busy. Its not unheard of for engies to do the flight program though.

I graduated from ERAU Daytona and spent a year in the flight program. Pretty fun school if you're really into aviation. Its got a heck of a price tag though. I'll be happy to answer any questions you have.

You old farts can be really annoying sometimes.

I built one, sort of. Bought an external enclosure from Thermaltake, has a fan and uses ESATA and USB2. Then just put a regular Western Digital 300GB HDD in to it. I'd probably do two things differently if I did it again though. First I'd get a 1TB HDD, but thats just because they're a lot cheaper now then before. Second, I'd try and find either an enclosure with a power button on the front, or one that's smart enough to shut down and start up with my PC. The enclosure I have now only has a power switch on the back.

Not much, haven't touched flight siming in a while. Life is...not going well as I would like, both for me and family thanks to government idiocy and the financial crunch. I'll probably be taking a look at both those aircrafts' flight data files to see what I can glean from them. The current flight data is a mix of Mirage Factory's F-15, some data I got from the Rafale, and crap I made up. It flies but...well, its interesting... I think I sent a message to FoxMonter asking for his pilot model to use. That way I could just retexture it to look like Isamu, but I never got a reply. May as well make a list of to-do's so you guys can heckle me: Finish Texture Work- Weathering, details, lights, landing gear, gear bays and doors. Also need to make a more organized PSD for the texture kit. Finish Weapons - Most hardpoints are in place, adjustment of weapon positions and texturing of hardpoints needs to be done. Middle gunpod hardpoint is still missing. Finish Cockpit- This is the biggest hurdle. No texturing is done. Attempts at the 360 degree HUD were only marginally successful, greatest problem was the textures became blurry at larger sizes. I also have little/no knowledge on creation and placement of the instruments and I just have no urge to do it. Thinking of borrowing displays from the F-35 and reworking the icons. Finish Data Files - Probably more work here than I realize. Tons of data leftover from the F-15 that needs to go. Lots of data causing frequent crashes because of all the editing I've done without cleaning up the file. Also need to make the flight model behave more like it should. Thrust ratings from the movie are WAY too much for reality. I'll probably pick up SFP2 soon, so expect any release to be to that standard at least. Assuming its ever released.

Anybody try out the Mercenary Campaign yet? I'd like to know if there were any changes there.

Okay, took a look at the way the F-14 handled some of its weapon stations and that gave me some ideas. I'll play around tonight and see what I can come up with.

Not quite sure. There will be one set of pylons on the wing proper, sort of what you see in the picture, except I moved it out a bit. Those are dedicated to A2A missiles. I've placed another set at the wing root, which is between the wing and the fuselage, you can sort of see the are in that picture above. Thats for mounting single larger A2A or A2G ordnance. Two more near flush hardpoints will go inbetween the engines. Those were supposed to just mount large bombs and such but I think I'm lacking room for missiles, may have to make them long enough for larger missiles. Also possible to put one more set of pylons on the outter wing. EDIT: Here's what I put together today.

Okay, so I guess I'll be modelling my pylons and racks from the ground up. Anybody know of some source material I can use to get started? I think if I just go making stuff up it won't look so good. EDIT: Orrrrr I could just go make stuff up because I have nothing better to do. What do you think? Untextured at the moment of course. Can't say I know a whole lot about weapon systems so I'm pulling it out of my butt here.

I'll shoot some questions your way Spectre, although I'll warn you I like to ask questions and collect info. Drove 100 miles just for a drug test today, one less thing to worry about.

Yeah, KGEG Tower. I'm assuming its an up/down so I guess I'll be sent back for radar training in a year. Breezed past my physical today, still waiting on finger print cards in the mail. Was originally hoping for somewhere in Seattle, like Paine Tower, but I'm just happy to have a tower, and from what I've been hearing Spokane is really nice. Now if I could just find a place to live there. If I can remember still in a week or two when things die down again I'll try to package this up and give it a temp cockpit. Weapon systems were on the list after cockpit so I'll have to look into that as well, mostly figuring out how the hardpoints work.

Sorry for the lack of anything guys. My life went through some big ups and downs lately. As it is I've recieved my facility assignement (Spokane International) so I'm buried in paperwork and travelling all over doing physicals and medicals. Truth is, even if I wasn't super busy, I'm not sure I could finish this, the cockpit modelling is way over my head. I was really hoping someone would take me up on my offer to help me finish this but I never got any biters. I think in the end my talents only lie in modelling/skinning and not so much in cockpit creation and flight modelling. Anyhow, my previous offer for help still stands. Lets say if nobody offers before I move out to Spokane I'll try to remember to just upload what I have. Thanks for the interest guys, it means a lot. Sorry for not being able to finish this like I had wanted to.

A little background first. Our small local municipal airport which is primarily a corporate use and GA field used to have a little fly-in. Since there used to be few warbirds based at the airport they would fly some circles and call it good. I was just a young lad, probably 10 or 11, when I started volunteering. First it was plane washing, and, once it officially became an airshow, I helped park cars. My dad being the former air traffic controller that he is, eventually took over the parking lot position of the airshow committee. From then on I ended up working as an aircraft fueler and line safety volunteer. I watched as this little fly-in evolved into a real airshow. After September 11th the format of the airshow was changed into a one day long celebration of American independence. The date was changed to the first saturday after the 4th of July and the entire show culminated in a massive fireworks show. This year apparently they posted record attendence with over 25,000 attendees. Unfortunately, due to not being around because of college, I stopped volunteering a few years ago. This year I came as a spectator for what I assume will be my final Freedom Fest as I'll be moving eventually this year to Washington. This also being my first major event with the Sony Alpha DSLR, I was determined to get some good shots. Anyway, sorry for ranting. I'd like to share some of my favorite shots from the day. The entire set can be found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/thepirateking...57606017065669/ These are from the 4th, the day before the air show. I went over to shoot some of the early arrivals since I would be able to roam around the taxiways and ramp without crowd lines to impede me. These are the show itself. If you live near Northern Indiana and don't have plans next year, I really suggest this airshow, the staff really want everyone to have a great time and the performers really love to come here every year. Thanks guys.

Its a privately owned team known as the Starfighters.

Just to let you guys know, I did Thunder Over Michigan up at Willow Run this past weekend like I mentioned earlier. Airshow and weather were pretty disappointing. Shame to see such a great roster of performers get let down by such an awfully run airshow. I wasn't terribly happy with the photos that I came away with, but did manage some more high contrast grayscales that may have saved the day. The rest of the color shots can be found here http://www.flickr.com/photos/thepirateking...57606673569997/ Thanks

Reminds me that my best real life landings were always simulated dead stick. Shoulda been a glider pilot I guess.

So will you have underage girls in tight flight suits sitting prone in the cockpit with the camera pointed right at their butt just like in the show? For realism of course.