streakeagle

I just played the default F-4J Carrier Takeoff mission. I took off, circled back, and landed. The inability to move my head up to see over the nose is a problem, but the workaround is to recenter your view looking a little low, then look up a few degrees. The more you look up, the more your view is move up, so I was able to see over the nose well enough to have almost a perfect landing. It was almost as easy as landing in DCS World. Next, I played the default F-4E vs MiG-21MF mission over the desert. The real advantage of VR over TrackIR is the 1:1 head tracking which allows you to maintain a sense of where your nose is while you visually follow the target through your rear quarter with a smooth motion that is damn near identical to using padlock. I thoroughly enjoyed this fight as much as a DCS World VR fight. This makes SF2 feel like a new game. If only the terrain and cockpits were up to DCS World standards, I wouldn't know the difference from the experience in VR.

My review is up at amazon and there are two other reviews plus one rating with no visible review. Out of four ratings, this book has scored five stars every single time. So, I am not alone in thinking this is a really good book. While four reviews isn't many, having all four be five stars is a pretty nice start.

I got it much faster, and in fact it beat the other book here. I haven't had much time to read it, but I have already read several pages, enough to know what I have on my hands. First, let me say the English translation's publisher did an outstanding job. This book has the quality of a really good school textbook. It has a hard cover with high quality color printing with an unusual combination of a matte finish for the photographic elements and a gloss finish for the title block and author block. The pages are heavy weight and somewhere between a matte/gloss finish with excellent color photos and clear text that isn't too small, but small enough to cram a useful amount of information in between the countless gorgeous photos. Without even finishing the text, this is one of my best books. So, far I haven't seen any of the editing errors I have come to expect from translations, which makes it much easier to read. What it provides: 1. A comprehensive history of both development and operation of the Hind and its systems, including weapons employment and formation tactics. 2. Basic specifications of major variants. 3. A brief history of the opposition's attack helicopters. 4. Extensive number of high quality photos and some diagrams supporting the text. What is doesn't provide: 1. Blueprints, schematics, profiles, 3-view drawings. 2. Detailed flight performance. 3. Pilot manual. So, you won't be able to build a precise 3d model or learn how to fly the Hind from this book. But the photos are great for both traditional and 3d modelers to verify details, color schemes, etc. This is a great book, and I would highly recommend it to anyone that is a fan of Hinds, attack helicopters, or military aviation history.

One that I am beta testing. The entire F-4G series with refined 3d models inside and out is being finished as we speak. But I have no idea when it will be polished enough for release.

Taking off to hit air defenses surrounding an enemy air force base. En route to the target, loaded for bear! Taking a shot with a Standard ARM. Say good bye to the ZSU-23-4! It's a hit!

The problem is that India already has too many types of fighters in service. So, as I understand it, they are heavily in favor of buying more Dasault Rafale jets so they can get a better return on long term maintenance and supply.

At least one guy is already building a home sim pit for this monster. I can't wait to fly it.

The most useful parts of YAP are the aircraft carriers. They are very well done and many are not available any other way, or if there is a free one available, the free one is just plain ugly in comparison. Unfortunately, the carriers were designed to YAP / WOV specs, so they are not especially well suited to the updates provided by SF2:NA and they are generally divided into two models for each ship: one model for launching and one model for landing. This two model approach allows well placed objects on the carrier deck, which in pre-SF2NA days was the only way to populate the deck with aircraft. So launching, the cats are clear with aircraft blocking the landing, and the bow cats are usually blocked for the landing model. There are some mods floating around here at CombatAce for the YAP carriers to make them as SF2NA compliant as possible. So, if you love high poly, high resolution aircraft carriers from the Vietnam era, YAP is the way to go. They also have some more great carrier stuff in the separate 3d model shop for Korea and more modern carriers. But I don't have anything after YAP2 came out, i.e. YAP3, Rising Sun, 3d model shop, etc. because I pissed off Zero Cinco (05), the owner of the YAP products when I strongly disagreed with his rant against TK/Third Wire for the changes made in the 2008 patch for the SF/WoX series and SF2, which broke some of the "features" of YAP (such as inflight refueling) that were exploiting bugs in the core code. I never got the final YAP2 patches nor the promised free upgrade to YAP3. So, I personally don't care for the company and wouldn't support them. But if you like what they have, there is nowhere else to go to get it.

Where did you buy your serial numbers from? Some sellers were reselling licenses a few years back. ED banned the practice and all of the known "bad" serial numbers were deactivated by ED. Of course ED and their licensing system are far from infallible. They have switched to newer system that doesn't rely on typing in activation codes. So, if your licenses don't show as active/ok when you log into ED's website, you have to contact ED for support. They are the only ones that can tell you what is wrong and/or fix the problem. Good luck!

I would love to have had an Mi-24 ride like that! The only helo ride I have ever had was hanging out the side door of a UH-1 while flying low over the Hudson River near West Point, NY. If I could only have one helo ride, I would want it to be a UH-1, so that was a victory for me. But I would love a treetop ride at maximum speed in an AH-1, Mi-24, or AH-64. The combination of VR and DCS World helicopters has been amazing. I can't wait for the DCS Mi-24, OH-58, and AH-1. Helicopter flight models are hard to develop, so every helo in DCS feels very different as much from the skills/approaches of the different developers as from actual difference due to real world design and performance. Realistic or not, the variety in feel, stability, etc. is challenging and fun. Unlike fixed wing fighters, I don't know a whole lot about the real world numbers/equations, so I enjoy whatever is delivered with less critical complaints. I don't even have any data points to challenge their results. I have tons of flight manuals for US fighters and some Soviet, but not one manual for helos. In this case, ignorance has been bliss. I have a lot more fun not knowing the top speed and/or climb rate is off by 15% or more or that the engine should be harder or easier to overheat than it is. Whereas, I know that the AoA indication should change decrease by about 1 unit when the gear is retracted on an F-4E/F/G while it should increase by about 3 units on all other F-4's with the larger nose as I own and have extensively studied the flight manuals for the F-4B/C/D/E/F/G/N/S. I am only missing the manuals for the RN/RAF F-4K/M variants. But your book could be my start down the slippery slope of collecting helicopter references.

I also hope this book helps get me ready for the DCS Mi-24P ;) The Take On Helicopters Mi-24 was a disappointment... not really any better than what you could already fly in the OFP / ArmA series in terms of flight model and systems modeling. But until DCS released the UH-1 and Mi-8, OFP/ ArmA series was my go-to helo sim because of the immersive experience of flying actual helicopter recon, attack, transport, and rescue missions as a small part of a huge environment. FSX and X-Plane have much better flight and systems modeling, but in OFP/ArmA, there is a huge world of AI and even other players that you can pick up, drop off, or kill. With DCS World, I can now fly a UH-1 on the same variety of missions with a similar immersive experience with much better graphics, flight modeling, and insane systems modeling. Then I can switch to the Mi-8 which performs similar roles but provides a radically different flight/operation experience. With the Mi-24 being derived from the Mi-8, I would expect the DCS Mi-24 to feel like a heavier Mi-8. It will be interesting to see what your book says, then compare what it is like flying the Mi-24 in DCS.

The only dedicated helicopter books I really have are a mid to late 1980s Salamander book, Modern Fighting Helicopters, and an Osprey book, US Army AH-1 Cobra Units in Vietnam. So, this will be a very nice addition. I am expecting various problems with the text due to translation. But if it has lots of good photos and lots of accurate technical and/or historical information it will be worth the price. I only have five helicopter models hanging from my ceiling that is otherwise covered with fixed wing aircraft, predominately single-seat fighters. Among those five helicopter models is the Mi-24 along with the UH-1, AH-1, AH-64, and the Bell Model 47 (US Army H-13 Sioux). That should tell you where the Mi-24 stands on my list of favorite/historically important combat helicopters.

I have a brand new copy on order at amazon. I paired it up with the latest edition of Sukhoi Interceptors that I have been wanting to get. Your book is "Prime" but is delayed until almost the end of april, whereas the other book is regular shipping and is supposed by be here the first week of April. Corona Virus scrambling up Amazon's shipping system.

Startups are only for people who want to do them. You can start hot and ready, or you can use a start key combo that automatically performs the startup procedure. Some aircraft like the F/A-18C, F-86F, and especially the F-5E are pretty easy to fly and fight, not much if any harder than SF2... but unlike SF2 the gunsight doesn't track off the HUD glass, you can record and play back missions, experience/view ejection, and if you are really determined, try your hand at refueling. Carrier ops in VR can't be beat and unlike SF2, there is no problem seeing over the nose when flying at the correct angle of attack and landing speed. But I do own quite a few flight manuals, so I really enjoy getting to apply them. I like being proficient in as many aircraft as I can. The hardest part is remembering what controls are mapped to what buttons since I have to use the same game controllers to mimic such an incredibly wide variety of control strategies.

When an SF series player watches that video, they can get an idea why DCS World became my primary sim years ago. When WOV added aircraft carriers to the SF series, it was a big deal for me. When SF2 North Atlantic improved naval operations, that was pretty sweet, too. But flying an F/A-18C or F-14B in DCS right now is already dramatically more fun as well as looking far better and being almost as realistic as possible. When this comes out and all the major bugs are worked out, even the FSX/P3D/XP civil sim crowd will have to admit that they can't compete. This is coming to my hard drive very soon, so I guess it is a good thing I got my F-14B proficiency way up a month ago. But I need to jump back in the Hornet. I have been flying the MiG-21bis for the past couple of weeks and wasn't flying much at all for a couple of weeks when things were just too busy at home.

My wingman missed with his second missile, so our launch rails are empty and we are heading home. Touchdown! Finding a parking spot because it's now Miller time!

I may be all out of ARMs, but my wingman wants a piece of the action. It is the same story as before. And it has the same ending, too.

I have another Standard ARM... and I found another Shilka. History does tend to repeat itself... and the quarterback is toast!

Yes, they had a free trial of the F-15 and Su-27. It was posted in their weekly news update.

The original game didn't have carriers. WoV added carriers. WoE added clouds. WoI fixed a lot of the issues with AI and flight models introduced by WoV and WoE as well as adding better modeling of radar/ecm. If the base install of SF2 came with everything, there would have been no incentive to buy SF2V, SF2E, etc. As it was, the majority of SFP1/WoX purchasers never bought any of the SF2 releases and quite a few people exploited the lack of copy protection to pirate the series. I am not sure why TK even started messing with SF2 again given that he seems to be far more successful at generating revenue with his mobile games without investing nearly as much time, effort, and money.

SF2 was coded for Windows Vista, which inadvertently made it compatible with Windows 7. Windows 10 and the hardware drivers supporting it are a moving target. Don't expect any noticeable code changes if SF2 already runs well on your Win10 pc. What is coming will eliminate some problems under the hood and allow TK to market SF2 as a proper Win10 compatible game. Bringing the game up to Windows 10 coding standards also paves the way for future development, should TK believe it may be profitable again. I can't think of a single sim that stepped into the niche that SF2 filled: the Jane's Fighters Anthology lite survey sim. But his timing may be a little late as ED is going to release a dumbed down version of DCS World with all the main fighters in one package, which will inherently feature the things SF2 was always missing: multiplayer, recording missions, ejection sequences, and maybe air-to-air refueling. But the beauty of SF2 is that presumably most if not all of the previous SF2 mods will still be compatible, maintaining SF2's huge advantage: comprehensive libraries of aircraft, vehicles, ships, and maps from all eras of aviation from WWI to the recent past. If TK could afford to shoe-horn in a newer graphics engine and provide the plugins and tools needed to update existing models and create new, massively updated terrains, he would have a winner.

I will get the WW1 game eventually, too. Not sure about the tank game. I have DCS Combined Arms, but never use it. My preferred tank is the M60A1. Steel Beasts Pro PE has the M60A3, so it is my preferred tank game, especially since it is the DCS:World of tank games, being more of a study sim used for real-world training.

The Soviet Navy was huge and had an impressive submarine force. But it was never a "blue water" Navy. Coastal defense is a limited capability compared to controlling the sea lanes and power projection. China has a long way to go and numbers of vessels isn't the whole story. It is also the ability to operate them over extended time frames far away from home port. The Chinese may be able to improve it, but the Russian aircraft carriers have been less than impressive to date. When the Chinese are able to perform ASW well enough to prevent US Navy submarines from operating in their waters or within torpedo range of their ships, they might be useful. In the mean time, China doesn't have anything that can't be sunk overnight.

Back in 1997, I climbed up on the XB-70 landing gear so that I could touch it's skin. I saw the N9 fly around 1996-1997 as well.

The FA-18 has always been capable of pulling 90 degrees of AoA and recovering. Not quite as good as the Su-27's 120-130 degrees, but certainly outstanding by any measure. However, the flight control system isn't programmed to permit it. It is a risky flight regime that is pretty much worthless in combat. The pitch authority of the Hornet in a combat environment is still one of the best beyond the F-22 and F-35. You don't need a "cobra" to fire an AIM-9X.