And, see, for me, DCS is the ONLY outfit I’d want doing this, especially after dealing with the personalities behind the development of the SF series.
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Was admiring the F-22 and wishing there was a modern sim featuring. I know that classified info prohibits a detailed module, but would there be a chance for Modern Air Combat? Would so love to fly an F-22 and F-35 with a believable flight model and realistically logical operations. Barring DCS, is there anything out there featuring either of these birds? I know Total Air War is out there, but it is so old!
Well, there is a FSX/P3D F-35A/B/C, reviewed here: Articles - Mudspike Forums
For DCS, ED has repeatedly stated there will be no more FC level modules. There might be a mod or two but I find myself doubting that. Doing a F-35 or F-22 in DCS would be a pretty massive undertaking and given that it’d be mostly guesswork, ED would never sign off on a license for it, let alone LockMart.
Thanks, I’ll check out the review.
I guess I’m confused. I thought that Modern Air Combat was a FC level module…
Right, it is – just of existing FC aircraft and a few high fidelity modules watered down. It’s basically moving FC3 ahead to the new DRM scheme and ditching Starforce, as well as bringing the aircraft to 2.5 standard. The addition of MiG-15, MiG-21, F-86, and F-5 are just to sweeten the deal.
ED isn’t going to add a, say, F-4 unless it already exists as a high fidelity module and they’re making MAC2.
Ah, got it!
That freeware F-35 looks pretty dang good! It’s been a long time since I’ve looked at FSX and have yet to try P3D. Do either of those allow shooting?
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I believe the TACPAC does but it might be for P3D only. I’ve never messed with FSX or P3D as their focus is primarily civil aviation, but stuff like TACPAC is supposed to enable weapons usage. Keep in mind that the F-35 addon in question has moved onto payware for the latest versions and I believe TACPAC is also payware.
Also, if you want another old sim/game, F-22 Lightning 3 is available from Steam:
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In the recent podcast here…
…it sounds like MAC is now a completely separate product. Wags also stressed how it isn’t really targeted at DCS users, as more a fun/casual thing.
Interesting.
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I listened to that yesterday, sounds like a fairly risky proposition. He said it wasn’t targeted at the established DCS player base, so are you going after War Thunder? Just seems like a tall order considering how established the other games in the market are.
I was excited when FC4/MAC/DCS Thunder was initially announced because I thought it would be adding more aircraft in the FC3/IL2 manner. Now I’m not really interested.
And honestly the scope of what MAC is has changed so much since the initial announcement, it wouldnt surprise to me to see it change again before its all said and done.
Gateway drug.
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MAC is basically the old Jane’s Sims with better graphics and fidelity. How many of got hooked with those back in the day? I wouldn’t be surprised if sales for MAC do better than DCS products honestly.
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I have to disagree, because the old Jane’s sims often had a lot more immersion going on. I don’t mean to slight ED/DCS/MAC, but they’re very much focused on systems simulation, which can be fun in the right context… But it’s nowhere near the fun of made-up stuff we saw in the Jane’s titles. Now, maybe I’m wrong and ED plans to make MAC in this way, with heaps of mission and single player content to keep the adrenaline going, but so far they’ve been coming up short in that regard.
Both the MiG-29 and the Su-33 have been excellent additions to my library and I enjoy them a lot for the quick, simple spin they add to DCS, so I wish ED would plan to do more like that, but if the plan is to make MAC a kind of DCS-War-Thunder with it, I don’t think it will be quite what we’re looking for. On the other hand, make it like a Jane’s USAF or ATF and yeah, that could work.
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That’s a fair point, and at the moment DCS really hasn’t prioritized the non-systems aspect of the game. Slapping some fancy briefing screens and basically a single player storyline in wouldn’t be that hard to do. Dynamic campaign, yadda yadda, I know, but a good branching campaign would be much simpler and easy to do. Besides most of my favorite gaming memories from that era are from branching campaigns.
So I’ll agree that right now MAC looks to be half of the old Janes sim’s, and if DCS can bring in the the other half they’ll have a winner.
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Any updates on MAC? I saw a bug report about an auto-trim game setting in the Hornet forum at DCS and Wags said it was a feature they were looking at for MAC, but otherwise I haven’t heard anything in a loooonnnnnggggg time.
Any news?
Ton of work going on behind the scenes, but no new news to report, I feel like we are close to a big info dump on it sooner than later.
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That’s great to hear.
Well, that’s good to hear.
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